


your place in the family of things

by coffeesuperhero



Series: simple machines [2]
Category: Leverage
Genre: Coming Out, Eliot Spencer's Cooking, Eliot Spencer-centric, Internalized Homophobia, Multi, Queer Themes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-13
Updated: 2020-07-23
Packaged: 2021-03-05 04:15:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 40,919
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25238329
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/coffeesuperhero/pseuds/coffeesuperhero
Summary: He's here, he's queer, he's sort of getting used to it, or, Eliot realizes that he still has some work to do on understanding himself. With bonus new!team members.
Relationships: Alec Hardison/Parker/Eliot Spencer
Series: simple machines [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1889917
Comments: 293
Kudos: 306





	1. the sandwich.

**Author's Note:**

> Title from "Wild Geese," by Mary Oliver. 
> 
> \--
> 
> This story is a sequel to ["you do not have to be good.,"](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24767848#main) and probably won't make a lot of sense if you haven't read that first, so I'd suggest starting there. This'll be here waiting when you're done!
> 
> \-- 
> 
> This story is written and complete! I'm just posting a chapter at a time for the next 11 days, honestly for no other reason than times are tough and I'd really like a little something to look forward to every day for a bit. Enjoy! ♥

The first couple of weeks after everything's all nice and official are honestly some of the best weeks of Eliot's life. He's got his people, his rooftop farm, and his restaurant, and he has never been more convinced that out of all of their crew he would be the one who would adjust to a normal life the easiest, because at least for the first few weeks this is the simplest thing he's ever done. It should probably feel like more of an adjustment, but there's a way in which the only thing that's different is the sleeping arrangements. 

The first night, after they get back from the roof and drink their champagne and talk and then do a lot of things that aren't talking, the party moves upstairs, to the bed that a few weeks ago Parker had told him was big for a reason. He has Hardison on one side and Parker on the other, already asleep with her head on his chest and her arm stretched out towards Hardison, like she's keeping tabs on both of them, even in her dreams. 

Eliot looks down at the crown of her head. "Does she always fall asleep that easy?" 

"Some nights she doesn't sleep much at all, but when she wants to be asleep, she's out," Hardison informs him. "Good luck getting out of bed in the morning, by the way. She doesn't let go. Sometimes the only way I got up was to tell her that we could call you and maybe you'd come over and make pancakes." 

Eliot, who can recall multiple mid-morning phone calls or texts to that effect, looks over at Hardison and scoffs, "That's what that was about? You couldn't move your girlfriend?" 

"Our girlfriend, now," Hardison corrects. "And again, I wish you the best of luck in the morning. Can you put chocolate in pancakes? Because I recommend you start with that." 

"Of course you can put chocolate in pancakes. At least I don't have to drive over here to do that now," he says, shaking his head. 

"It does seem more convenient," Hardison yawns. He nuzzles at Eliot's shoulder. "But we don't just want you here for the pancakes." 

"You made that pretty clear, don't worry," he drawls, and Hardison just laughs, a sweet low sound in his ears. "Don't think I didn't notice the two of you putting me in between you all night, by the way. I noticed." 

"Parker did tell you we had a plan," Hardison laughs. 

"Yeah, well, I'm not complaining, but you don't have to do this all the time," Eliot tells him, waving his hand between all of them. "I told you, I don't want to come between you." 

"I'm cutting you some serious slack because this relationship is only officially a few hours old," Hardison says firmly, poking at a space between his ribs, "but you know eventually you're going to have to stop asking if we really want you here, right?" 

"I'm working on it," Eliot says, slapping at Hardison's fingers until he stops poking. "Like you said, it's new." 

"I said _officially_ new," Hardison reminds him. "Unofficially, come on, now. When did you move in here, like, months ago?"

"Fine, but every relationship has, I don't know, _rules_ , Hardison," Eliot frowns. "Maybe we should all talk about those sometime soon." 

"We can do that. Even if the only rule of this relationship as far as you and I are concerned is probably _give Parker whatever she wants_ ," Hardison jokes. 

"So far, so good," Eliot grumbles, but he's smiling. 

"Yeah," Hardison says softly, gazing at Parker. He reaches over and lays his hand on top of hers where it's resting on Eliot's ribs, and Eliot kisses the top of her head, and they're just a couple of idiots in love together for a few minutes while Parker, oblivious, keeps right on sleeping. She even snores a little. 

"She's really got us wrapped around her little finger like a couple of easy marks, doesn't she," Eliot mutters, but he's not mad about it. This is probably the happiest he's ever been, point of fact.

"She does," Hardison agrees. He traces the outline of Parker's fingers with one of his, like he's brushing a copy of it onto Eliot's skin. It isn't necessary, Eliot wants to tell him. They're both already there. 

"Well, it's Parker," Eliot says, like that should be explanation enough, and it is. He turns his head toward Hardison. "It's not just Parker." 

As confessions of love go it could probably be a little more specific but Hardison seems to understand it well enough, because he says, carefully, "I know," and kisses Eliot, very gently, and that goes on for a while, just careful, gentle love-drunk kissing, and there is still a part of him that wants to pull away from this because it's weird but that's getting a lot easier to ignore, because for a big old geek Hardison has also turned out to be a damn good kisser. 

There does come a point, eventually, where they have to stop kissing because it's gotten less careful and less gentle and neither of them is willing to wake Parker up, so they take a breath and stare at the ceiling for a minute and switch to talking instead. And that goes on for a while. They talk about jobs they've pulled, separate and together, they talk about Parker, they talk about nothing at all, and it's all very peaceful and lazy and sweet in a way that he had not previously known he could be. A late night storm has started up and there's rain on the windows and thunder rolling overhead and he's just laying here, holding Hardison's hand and talking about pointless shit while Parker sleeps, unbothered by the noise, and at least right here right now there's not a thing about his life he would change. He hasn't let himself be soft like this with anybody in a really long time, and definitely never with another guy, and okay, maybe he still needs a reminder now and again to _enjoy the experience_ , but the need for those gets fewer and farther between every day. That's a fucking relief.

It probably helps that he's completely, inescapably in love with these people, and maybe he should say that, although Parker's still asleep and maybe a couple of hours into a relationship seems a little early for confessing your undying love, or whatever, even if he kind of already did that. He didn't exactly say the words _I love you_ , he just agreed when Parker asked, but he sure as hell did say _for better or worse_ and _'til my dying day_ and he knows what a vow is when he says it, and he's got no plans to take it back. Hell, he'd probably marry them for real if he could, right now, drag them both back up to the roof in the rain and all and swap rings and just be done with it, forever and ever, amen, like the song says. 

"Maybe we should sleep," Hardison yawns, finally. It's absurd o'clock, now. Have they really just been talking, this whole time? He feels like he should feel like he's been talked to death, but he just feels warm. And tired, he realizes. 

"Maybe," Eliot says, yawning himself. "I gotta get up in a few hours, go over the new menu." 

"Oh yeah, I meant to tell you," Hardison says seriously, but in a tone that tells Eliot immediately that nothing Hardison is about to say is serious. "I thought of something. Nice spring addition to the menu." 

"This better not be another anchovy and pineapple pizza, Hardison." 

"Eliot, man, you know that wasn't an actual menu item, right? That was boyfriend bait," Hardison laughs. 

Eliot makes a face. "Come on, man." 

"I'm serious. Do you have any idea," Hardison says, trying not to laugh loud enough to wake Parker, "what your face looked like when you saw that menu?" He kisses the fingers of the hand that isn't still holding Eliot's. "It was perfect. We have stolen _so much money_ but I could never buy that moment. I may paint that shit on canvas and have Parker sneak in and hang it in the Louvre, because that was _art_ , baby. You're already a Renaissance man. Now you can be Renaissance art." 

"I can't believe this," Eliot grumbles. 

Hardison turns his head back toward Eliot, bumping his nose against Eliot's shoulder. "Oh, believe it. You gonna let up on the old _Hardison can't grift_ shit now? Because I got you pretty good." 

"You got nothing," he says, which is a bald-faced lie and they both know it, considering that he's saying it while he's laying here in bed with them.

"Uh huh. See, we figured we had to make sure we looked like we were really doing it all wrong to get your attention," Hardison says. He waves his hand around, indicating all three of them sprawled out together here in this bed. "Do you think it worked?" 

Eliot ignores this. "Did you actually have a contribution to the menu? Or were you just blowing smoke up my ass?" 

"Oh, no, I did," Hardison says, and from the way he says it, Eliot knows, he _knows_ , what's coming, but he waits, and sure enough, Hardison says, "It's a sandwich, right? I'm thinking maybe you start with, hmm, an everything bagel and you add cream cheese, maybe with some garlic and spring onions, and speaking of onions, how do you feel about Maui onions? You think those heirloom tomatoes might work on that?" 

"Dammit," he says, "Hardison." 

"I think it sounds amazing, personally, and I haven't even told you about the dill Havarti or the turkey." 

"Amazing? What's amazing is that you never ate my sandwich but somehow you know every last thing that I put on it," Eliot says, through clenched teeth.

"You know why? You know why I know all that? Because you have never stopped talking about that sandwich," Hardison says. "I have heard so many times about your damn cream cheese that I could probably make the thing myself." 

"You think you can recreate that masterpiece on your own, you go right ahead," Eliot says, waving his hand. 

"You think I can't?" 

"What I think is that you're a thief _and_ a liar," Eliot says. He holds up two fingers. "Rule two: don't take my fucking sandwiches, Hardison." 

"Oh, that's a rule now?" 

"It's been a rule! I would've just made you one! You were sitting right there while I made it, you could have just said, hey man, that smells amazing, can I have one, and I would have just made you one of your very own so--" 

"So I could hear you grumble about how you didn't want to do it while you did it anyway? Sometimes a man just wants a sandwich without all the complaining." 

"Sometimes a man just wants his own damn sandwich that no one stole," Eliot says. 

"Sometimes a woman just wants to sleep without her boyfriends arguing about a sandwich from three years ago," Parker groans, slapping at both of them without even lifting her head or opening her eyes. 

"Sorry, Parker," they say together. 

"I'll forgive you if you turn off the lights and go to sleep," she mumbles, and because they are, actually, wrapped around her little finger like a couple of easy marks, Eliot just shrugs, and Hardison reaches out and hits a button on his phone that kills the lights, and everybody resituates themselves in the bed until they're all good and comfortable. It isn't actually that different from how they were before, but Parker doesn't seem inclined to move much, so it's not like Eliot can really go anywhere, especially not with Hardison crowding in on his other side. He would say something, but it would be a hollow complaint. This is pretty good. Eventually he's going to find the words to say that to them instead of just cooking for them, but for now maybe it's enough that he's just letting himself belong here and not fighting it. 

"Eliot," Hardison says quietly, just before he's about to drift off to sleep. 

He opens his eyes. "Yeah?" 

"It was a fucking incredible sandwich, man." 

"Dammit, Hardison," he says again, and he sort of ineffectively elbows at him, but he just can't muster anything more than that. Hardison is warm and solid by his side and Parker is soft and sweet in his arms, and whatever revenge he can devise to exact for that sandwich will have to wait until tomorrow. 

+

When tomorrow arrives, he finds out pretty immediately that Hardison wasn't joking about the pancakes. 

Eliot stays in bed at least half an hour past the time he usually gets up, because it's so damn peaceful, even with Parker stuck to him like glue and Hardison drooling on his shoulder. The sun is drifting in through the slats in the blinds and everything's quiet except the slow, sleepy breaths of people he loves, and it's not any work at all to enjoy this. He watches the morning light move across the ceiling with a smile on his face. But both nature and the day are calling, and it is eventually time to move. Hardison is surprisingly easy to dislodge: he just gently moves the arm that Hardison has slung over his chest and Parker, then tips Hardison carefully over, and Hardison doesn't even stop quietly snoring as he rolls onto his back.

That just leaves Parker. As soon as he shifts around, he can hear her breathing change and he knows she's awake, so he shakes her arm carefully, just enough to indicate that he's getting up, but she sinks into the bed like a stone and he can tell she's not going anywhere.

"Parker," he murmurs, nudging her. "Need you to move, I'm getting up now." 

"Hmmph," she says, and burrows closer. "Warm." 

"Parker," he says again, and this time he decides, fuck it, he'll just get up, and then he immediately regrets all that time he spent showing her grapples. What a fucking mistake. "Hey, seriously, come on now." 

Her only response is to hold on tighter. He doesn't ever forget how strong she is, but if he needed something to jog his memory, her grippy fingers on his arm make five very strong reminders. He sighs and stares up at the ceiling. Parker is squeezing him so tight that her fingers are going to leave marks and he _really_ needs to get out of this bed, so he takes a breath, exhales loudly, and grumbles, "If you let me up, I'll make you pancakes." 

Parker makes a noise of vague interest, but apparently Hardison has already used that shit one too many times, because instead of immediately agreeing she turns her face so it's pressed against his sternum and mumbles, "What kind?" 

"Double chocolate chip," he says, emphasis on the _double_ , and yes, that was the right answer, because she's up and out of the bed and half dressed before his feet even hit the floor. 

"Come on," she says, tugging on his arm, half-hauling him the short distance to the edge of the bed. 

"Dammit, Parker, I'm going, I'm going," he insists, and as soon as he's standing she takes off, presumably for the kitchen. Behind him, Hardison's arm moves over the sheets, patting the empty space where his partners had been moments before. 

"What is happening," Hardison mumbles, still half-asleep. 

"Pancakes!" Parker calls, sounding like she is already in the kitchen, or most of the way there. Knowing Parker, she rappelled down there.

"Told you it would work," Hardison says. 

"Almost didn't," he says. 

"You're very warm," Hardison advises him. 

"So I've been told," he says, and then begins what turns out to be a very futile search of the bedroom for his pants. He finds them in the bathroom, eventually, after he gives up the search, and he does remember all of last night in very vivid detail, but he honestly has no idea how they wound up there. 

By the time he gets downstairs, Parker has already pulled out flour, sugar, milk, and eggs, and looks to be about a quarter of the way through eating a bag of chocolate chips. 

"Very helpful," he says, surveying the ingredients arrayed on the counter. He plucks the bag out of her hands and points to it. "Less helpful." 

"You took too long," she tells him, around a mouthful of chocolate. 

He just shakes his head, sets a griddle on the stovetop and turns the gas on, then shuffles to the pantry for salt and cocoa powder. He did say double chocolate, after all. He will deliver on that promise. 

Parker stands next to him and watches as he dumps dry ingredients into a bowl, cracks the eggs, pours in some milk, and stirs everything together. "How do you know how to do all of this?" she asks. "Did you learn in high school? Is that something they teach you?" 

He smirks only a little as he recalls home ec, which most certainly did not teach him to make pancakes. "Most of what I know, I know from Toby," he tells her, as he drops some butter on the griddle and it sizzles in the heat. 

"The guy with the truffles," she says, and he nods. 

"Toby taught me to make crepes," he says. "It's not hard to get to pancakes after you learn that. And-- my mom used to make 'em."

"Why didn't she teach you?" 

There are about a million answers to that question, and none of them are any he feels like giving this early in the morning, so he just shrugs and says, "She didn't really have time, I guess," which is somewhere between the truth and a lie. Parker's quiet for a minute while he finishes up the batter, but when he goes to ladle some of it onto the griddle, she hops off the counter and slips her arms around him from behind. 

"Okay," he says, patting the arm that's around his waist. "Thank you for the support, but this isn't exactly helping." 

"No, but you don't really need my help with those," Parker says, and he smiles, but only because she's not looking. 

Hardison shuffles in a few minutes later, smiles sleepily at the two of them, and starts making coffee, while Eliot tries to continue with pancakes despite the Parker-sized impediment that's still clinging onto him. He manages to get some of the batter onto the griddle, but it's tough going. 

"Parker, come on, that's enough," Eliot says, when he nearly spills batter all over the stove.

"Yeah, I'm hungry, let the man work," Hardison says, but as soon as Parker relents and detaches herself, Hardison moves in, wrapping his arms around Eliot from behind and pressing his face against his neck. "Oh my god, you're so warm." 

"Hey," Parker objects, and reattaches herself to Eliot's side. 

"Didn't I just leave this party," Eliot grumbles, looking down at Parker and over at Hardison. 

"This is your life now," Hardison says, mumbling sleepily against his neck. "Two very attractive people draping themselves all over you all the time. I feel really sorry for you, man, must be really tough." 

"It's a hardship," Eliot says, biting down a smile. "Seriously, it is actually a hardship right now. It's hard to tell if these are done when they're chocolate. If I can't use my arms here, you won't have any damn pancakes." 

"Not with that attitude, we won't," says Hardison. Eliot shifts a little so he can nudge him in the ribs with his elbow. 

"We saw you beat up a bunch of guys with a garden hose once," Parker says. "While you were in handcuffs. We're not even fighting you. You can figure this out." 

"Okay," he says, eying a couple of pancakes that are definitely getting too done. "I get it, okay? You wanted me, you got me, I accept. It's an equilateral triangle, or whatever the fuck you said. I get it, _awesome_! Now stop clinging onto me like moss on a damn rock and let me make you these goddamn pancakes!" 

Parker and Hardison share a look that-- from what Eliot can see of it-- seems equal parts smug and genuinely happy, then they both kiss him on the cheek and relocate to the stools on the other side of the island. He just shakes his head and transfers three slightly overdone pancakes to a plate and pours more batter on the griddle. 

"Are you two gonna stare at me the whole time?" he asks, when he looks up to see that they are both just sitting there, _gazing_ at him, for lack of a better word. 

"Yep," says Parker. 

"What's the point of having a hot boyfriend who cooks if you can't stare at him while he makes you pancakes?" Hardison asks. "Even if it is at an un _godly_ hour." 

"Well, _enjoy the view_ , I guess," he tells them, flipping some pancakes over. "But I have news for you, this is late for me. I slept in. _Someone_ wouldn't let me up." 

Parker just smiles. 

Hardison gestures towards her and then at Eliot. "I told you so. Also, five-thirty in the morning is late for you? You're a freak," Hardison tells him. "But I love you." 

Eliot just shakes his head and pushes some plates across the counter. He does tell them he loves them. He just does it with pancakes. 

+  
**Tuesday, March 12th, 2013**

**_The Fulcrum-- Daily Special_ **

**The Sandwich**. _Housemade garlic & spring onion cream cheese, Oaxacan jewel heirloom tomato, arugula, thinly sliced smoked turkey, dill Havarti, & caramelized Walla Walla onions on an everything bagel. So good that if your neighbor orders one and you don't, you'll probably steal it. Do your friend a favor: get your own._

"This is it?" Parker asks, staring at the plate in front of her. 

Eliot nods. "Yep." 

"Okay," Parker says. She picks up the sandwich and takes a bite. 

Eliot watches her experience it, waiting for the verdict. He has made one small modification-- different onions-- in the name of local sourcing, but otherwise, it's the same masterpiece. "Well?" 

"It's good," she says, setting the sandwich down carefully. "It's just-- could you make it _brighter_?" 

"Brighter," Eliot repeats, and she shrugs.

"I don't know another way to describe it," she says. "It's nice. It could be brighter." 

He pulls the plate back, picks up the sandwich, and takes a thoughtful bite. "You know what? You're right. Hang on, I've got an idea." 

He locates another prep bowl, throws some arugula in with a little salt and a squeeze of lemon, and adds it to the sandwich. He pushes the plate back to Parker. "Try it now." 

This time, when she takes a bite, she smiles, nods, and takes another bite. "Mm-hmm," she hums, and gives him a thumbs up. "Better. Brighter." 

"Good," Eliot grins, as Hardison comes over to see what they're doing. 

"Ooh, is that what I think it is?" 

Parker pulls the plate away as he reaches for it. "Get your own," she says, curling her arm around her plate like a dragon guarding its gold. "This one's mine." 

"Rule one," Eliot laughs, and makes a show of checking his watch and walking backwards out of the kitchen. "Oh, look at the time. I've got to get to work on some stuff for the farm, can't talk, see you later." 

"You're not gonna make me the damn sandwich, are you," Hardison grumbles, arms folded across his chest.

"You said you could make your own," Eliot shrugs, pausing in the doorway. "Oh. We did change it a little bit, though, didn't we, Parker?" 

"Mmmhmm," she nods, as the last bite of sandwich disappears into her mouth. "So good." 

"I didn't think you could improve on perfection," Eliot says, "but we did. Anyway, man, enjoy recreating that on your own." 

"Wait," Hardison calls, as Eliot's leaving. "What else did you put on it? Eliot? Eliot! Parker, come on, give me a hint."

Eliot laughs the whole way to the roof. Revenge tastes like arugula and lemon, apparently. Who would have thought.


	2. sloe & steady.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's not all pancakes and domestic bliss when you're trying to figure out how to be whoever it is that you are.

They do, over peach and brown sugar pancakes, a few mornings later, finally discuss some rules and boundaries for this relationship beyond _give Parker whatever she wants_. 

"I don't know what you want to talk about," Parker says, frowning at Eliot over a forkful of macerated peaches. "We're together. We said that part already." 

"Yeah, we did, and nobody's walking that back, if that's what's worrying you," he says. He pushes his thumb carefully against the concerned crease that has appeared between her eyebrows, waiting for it to disappear. "When people get into relationships they usually at least talk about, I don't know, whether or not they're only seeing each other or other people, for a start." 

The crease reappears between Parker's eyebrows. "Is that what you want?" 

"Hell no," he says. "Maybe you didn't notice, but I pretty much married the two of you the other month, so." 

"Huh," Hardison says, his face thoughtful. He sets his fork down with a big bite of pancake still stuck to the tines. "You did kinda say both for better or worse and 'til death do us part, didn't you." 

"I did," Eliot says, crossing his arms over his chest. "And I meant it. I don't want anybody else. I didn't think you did, either. But seeing as how nobody's brought it up, I thought maybe I should." 

"Oh," Parker says. "That's nice. I don't want anyone else either. Three is a good number." 

"Same here," Hardison says. "You know, for better or worse." 

"For forever," Parker agrees. "I don't like saying the death part." 

"Fair enough," Eliot says. "Forever works for me."  


They all look at each other for a minute. It's funny. Eliot always thought marriage meant a very specific set of circumstances, and precisely none of those things have happened in the last five minutes, months, or years, but he doesn't feel any less tethered to these people than he thinks he might if there'd been a minister to announce _I now pronounce you two husbands and a wife_. Not that any minister would. Well. Maybe some of them would, for enough cash. 

"Well, that's settled," says Hardison, and digs back into his pancakes. "I didn't expect to wake up married this morning but I'm pretty okay with it." 

Eliot shakes his head. "Hang on, I wasn't done," he says. 

Parker frowns again. "What else is there to talk about?" 

"Sex," Eliot says, and when Parker looks like she's about to abandon her pancakes and haul them both upstairs, he holds up his hand. "I don't mean, let's go have sex, I mean, we need to talk about it." 

"I mean, I am very happy and satisfied," Hardison says. "If you're looking for reviews." 

"I could be happier," Parker says, "but only if were having sex right now." 

"We can get to that," Eliot tells her, "after breakfast. But first we're gonna actually have to talk about when we have sex, and everybody's gonna say their piece so we make sure we're all on the same page." 

"Hmm. Is this about what I asked you before?" Parker says. She steals a slice of peach from Eliot's plate, and he lets her, because it's a rule. "About all of us together all the time or not?" 

"Yeah," says Eliot. "Is that how this works? We only have sex when we're all together? Because we're all in the same place right now and that's easy, but eventually Hardison's gonna go to another nerd convention, or we're gonna be in different places for a job, and if two of us are in the same place without the other one, then what?" 

"I don't care if y'all enjoy each other's company while I'm at cons," Hardison says. "Or wherever. I don't care if you do that while I'm here, actually. Nobody wants to have sex all the time. If y'all are feeling it and I'm not, go enjoy." 

"Parker?" Eliot asks. He isn't sure when he turned into the sex moderator, around here, but it's not like they both haven't occasionally treated him like some kind of walking sex encyclopedia for the last several years, so this was probably inevitable. And they do actually need to talk about this, and he has probably had more sex than both of them combined and then some, so here they are. 

"I don't care if the two of you have sex without me," she says. Her eyes get glossy for a minute. "Hmm. Or if I am there. I don't mind watching. That sounds fun. Can we do that?" 

"Yes, but you're still participating, in that scenario," Eliot points out. "Just because you're not touching us doesn't mean you're not involved. That's not what I'm asking." 

"I already said it doesn't bother me," she says, shrugging. "It doesn't. I like the idea that you're somewhere being happy together. Whether we're all home or you're both somewhere else or whatever." 

"What about you," Hardison asks him. "Is that okay with you?" 

"I feel the same way both of you do," Eliot shrugs. "I just felt like we needed to say it, because as the newest member of this little team, I am not about to be responsible for somebody feeling left out." 

"That makes sense," Hardison says. He reaches over and squeezes Eliot's hand. "I get where you're coming from now. I thought maybe you were just still sort of unclear about the fact that we very clearly want you here." 

"Well, I didn't notice all of your weird boyfriend bait and you didn't notice I married you, so I guess we're even," Eliot says. "We said it was an equilateral triangle. I'm just trying to keep it that way." 

"Well, then that's the rule," Parker says, and he and Hardison look over at her. "If somebody feels left out then they have to say something." 

Hardison nods slowly. "Yeah. But like, don't sleep on it. Bring it up when you feel that way." 

"Works for me," Eliot says.

Parker smiles. "So, was there anything else, or..." She looks upstairs and then back at the two of them, wiggling her eyebrows expectantly.

"I'm good," Hardison says, finishing the last bite of his pancakes. "No more conversation needed from me at this moment." 

Eliot looks down at his plate, which had at least six peach slices before they started talking, but which now has none, because Parker has stolen them all. 

He smiles. "Yeah," he says. "I'm good." 

+

If the whole thing had just been pancakes and sharing a bed and all the other stuff and they never had to leave the apartment or interact with the rest of the world, it would have stayed easy. But there is in fact a whole world out there with other people in it, and as it turns out there's a big difference between figuring out how to be himself at home and how to do the same thing in the world.

Eliot realizes that he might still have some work to do on himself during dinner service on a busy Friday in March, a few weeks after the relaunch. He's been in the kitchen all night, pitching in because one of the kitchen crew had a family thing come up. The employees would probably disagree, but Eliot has actually been making an effort to stay out of the kitchen and let the staff handle things most of the time. Everybody in there is more than competent to execute the menu to his standards, and he's got enough to do planning out the roof and greenhouse space, to say nothing of building the new Leverage. But when they're short they know they can call him, and tonight they have. It's a good thing, too, because even for a Friday they're busy, and they're running themselves pretty ragged.

There's a lull in orders around nine that evening, just enough for them to catch their breath, and he's drinking some much-needed water by the doors in the back with some of the staff, including Amy. 

"They're just really sweet together," Amy sighs suddenly. Eliot follows her gaze across the restaurant, where Hardison and Parker are standing. Hardison has his arm around her shoulders while they're talking with a couple of regulars at the end of the bar. 

"Yeah," Eliot agrees, smiling a little. "Sure are." 

"It's just nice, you know? We see so many people come through here on dates that don't work out, or nursing a breakup. It's really refreshing to see two people who are just...happy in love." 

Eliot just nods. They are two people, for sure. It's on the tip of his tongue to correct her, to explain, but he just can't quite make the words happen. She's Parker's friend, not his, and if Parker hasn't gotten around to mentioning the whole thing to her yet, it's not really his place, and anyway, what would he even say? _Hey, they're with me_ , feels sort of needlessly aggressive, and _Those are my people_ is weirdly possessive, and _Maybe you wouldn't know it to look at me but I go home with those people every night and I am very into both of them,_ is, huh, very personal for a casual workplace interaction even if true. Which it is. True. Even if it's still hard for him to get his mouth or his brain around the word _bisexual_ , it sure does still seem to be an accurate description for the reality of his life. 

Amy hustles away a minute later to check on her tables, oblivious to the fact that Eliot's just standing there, holding a bottle of water, having some kind of internal meltdown. That's sort of comforting, in a way. It would be a lot worse if someone noticed. 

It bugs him all through the rest of dinner service, a constant noise in his head the whole time he's cooking. He probably cycles through the same damn series of thoughts a hundred times, thinking that he should have just said something, except it's nobody's business. Thinking it would just make things weird, but why should it be weird, it isn't weird, maybe sometimes a couple is actually three people and what's wrong with that? He should have just said something. And then the whole thought process starts all over again.

He tells Hardison about it later after they close up for the night and Eliot's back home. Hardison's working on some new surveillance equipment or something downstairs, so Eliot settles in at the table with a beer and watches him work. He doesn't even manage to bring the thing with Amy up until he's halfway through his drink. 

"I don't know," he tells Hardison, after describing the whole thing. "It was weird. I guess I just figured everybody knew."

"We all held hands in the restaurant maybe once," Hardison points out. "That's about the extent of the context clues anybody has." 

Eliot frowns and takes a sip of his beer. He shrugs. "I guess. It's not like it's anybody's goddamn business, anyway." 

"Right," says Hardison, but the way he says it is tight and almost rough in a way that Eliot doesn't understand and definitely doesn't like. 

"Well?" he demands, setting his beer down. "Is it anybody's goddamn business?" 

Hardison sighs and looks up from his gadgets. "No, it isn't. You don't have to tell anybody anything you're not comfortable with. And as long as that's your choice and not your internalized homophobia talking, we're cool." 

"What the hell, Hardison," he snaps, because he had almost talked himself back around to the idea that now that they're all together and he can sometimes hold Hardison's hand in public, at least in the confines of their own brewery, that he had graduated from gay school or whatever and he didn't have to do any more exploring of all the ways that he is still remarkably uncomfortable with who he is.

"I said what I said, man," Hardison murmurs. 

"Yeah, I heard you," Eliot says. "I have no idea what to do with it, but I heard you." 

"It's-- look, I am not saying this to put pressure on you in any way, so you have to promise me you won't take it like that," Hardison says, and Eliot shrugs. "I need you to say it." 

"I promise," he says. 

"Okay. It's just-- we have watched you with all those women for like, five years, Eliot, I know you're capable of being physically comfortable with other people in public, as long as it's women. And I'm not pushing, I'm not really even asking, I just-- I don't know. I wouldn't mind if some of that found its way to me, in public, one of these days."

Eliot sits back in his chair. It had maybe never occurred to him that that was something he could really even do, in public, with a guy. Romance. Flirting. Whatever. In his limited experience, guys just mean sex, not relationships. Stuff you do in the dark on hot summer nights by the river. It's not romance. It's not forever. It's definitely not love. But this thing, with Hardison, and Parker, is all those things, so, yeah. Shit. 

This potluck is just an infinite source of garbage, apparently. What a fun fucking journey he's on. 

"Hardison," he says, and christ, his voice sounds hoarse. "I'm just--" 

"What did you just promise me," Hardison interrupts. "It's not pressure. I'm not pushing. Just think of it as an open door. Walk through it when you want. If you want." 

"Uh, yeah," he says, and Hardison sort of sighs, and Eliot looks away, into his beer, at the wall, at the landing that leads to the apartment and the life that they share. 

Jesus jumped up christ, this is a lot. This is why he doesn't do relationships. Well, this, and the fact that his professional life has definitely not allowed for anything more significant than a weekend-long fling here and there. You fall in love with someone-- or more than one someone-- and then you start making promises, and then you keep them, unless you're eighteen and a dumbass and you just signed your life away to the army. But he isn't eighteen anymore and he does love these two people and he promised them a lot of things. Vowed it, basically. To keep them safe. To be part of their lives as an actual point on this damn triangle and not just the guy in the background carrying a torch for them both that burns so bright it rivals the sun. Until his dying day, 'til death do him part, et fucking cetera. That's what he said. So he probably can't just keep on like this, pretending that he can be everything he wants to be for them without figuring out who he is, too. It's a lot of shit he was hoping he wouldn't have to wade through, but he'd do a whole hell of a lot worse for these people if the situation demanded it, so surely he can do this, too. 

He'd say he doesn't know where to even start unraveling all of this mess in his head about himself and queer shit, but that ain't true. He knows. He knows it like he knows the sound of a CIA chopper or a military satellite or ex-Soviet army footprints in the snow. It's a very distinctive place, after all. It's home. 

Home's a weird concept. He's had a lot of them and none at all, except that's not quite true, because even when he tried to be no one from nowhere, underneath it all he was still Eliot Spencer from Pauls Valley, Oklahoma. Sometimes it feels like he reaffirms it every time he speaks, that Oklahoma accent putting everyone who hears it on notice. He's been gone from there for so long now, but it doesn't matter. Feels like it's in his blood. And maybe it's precisely because he's been gone so long that he's dragging his feet on dragging all his skeletons out of his closet so that he can, ha, finally, step out of the closet himself, because the longer he's been away from there the easier it is to hold that place up like it was some kind of paradise. The truth is a lot more complicated than that, but how many people has he run across in his life who hear the way he talks and get this look on their face like, _Oh, listen to this hick_ , and then try to pull one over on him. Country boys can't be smart, after all. 

And he's used that assumption to his advantage more often than not, and that's fine, but it's also made him more than a little defensive of where he's from specifically and places that remind him of it generally. He remembers being in Nebraska for that kid and the boxing gym and Sophie just complaining constantly about the food, wondering why people would willingly jump in the ring to get beat up instead of doing literally anything else, and because it was Sophie, because she was his crew and his friend, he thinks he did all right just explaining it instead of jumping down her throat, but if it had been anyone else, they'd have gotten an earful and them some. Because there's nothing else _to_ do, sometimes, in these places that the rest of the world has forgotten or just plain written off because they're rural, because they're small town, because they're backward. They talk funny. They wear weird jeans. They're not smart. Sure. Whatever. It probably doesn't matter a hill of beans to anybody back home that he bothers to defend it, but he feels sort of honor-bound to do it anyway.

And he's spent so long defending home that it's hard to acknowledge that in some ways, some very specific ways, home was actually pretty damn backwards, and that for all those small town brother's keeper Christian love-thy-neighbor-as-thyself commandments, home didn't do right by him or by a lot of other people like him. Just because there are plenty of other places that like to think they're better when they're not, when it comes to that shit, doesn't mean home wasn't always good for him, too. And if he wants to figure out how to be comfortable with himself, he's going to have to start back there, acknowledging that some of that shit was fucked up, and that just really stings. He hates it a little, feels like he's proving these people right who look down on the places and people like the ones that raised him. But the fact is, it was hard, sometimes, and queer is just not something you were, back home. 

Oh, it's not like he didn't know gay people existed when he was a kid. He did. It's not like, very deep down, so deep down you'd need an industrial drill to reach it, he didn't know he was one of them. He knew at sixteen, to be specific, when he hooked up with his friend Jarrod's cousin Porter, who was visiting for the summer from Fort Worth. They were supposed to be fishing for catfish, and one thing led to another and they kinda caught each other instead. And it wasn't half bad, as far as _oh-shit-goddamn-I-don't-know-what-my-hands-are-doing_ teenage fooling around goes. But as the President of his high school's Fellowship of Christian Athletes, a younger Eliot Spencer also understood that it was not something that good God-fearing Christian boys did. And even if they did, they weren't, you know, gay. 

Because evidence suggested that plenty of good, God-fearing Christian boys did indeed mess around with each other at parties or the showers or late nights down by the Washita when nobody else was around to know or care. There just wasn't a lot going on, that was all, so they made their own fun. But that didn't make them gay, exactly, it just made them horny teenagers with nothing better to do, and anyway sometimes there were girls around too. Didn't matter what went on down by the river or the back of somebody's truck. What mattered was that you showed up for church on Sunday and for football practice every weekday morning and eventually you married a nice girl and settled down and forgot that you thought about anything else, and mostly importantly you never, ever, talked about all those nights by the river, or wherever. Don't ask. Definitely don't tell. 

But while that might be the way of things in south central Oklahoma, he is many miles from there. Ain't nobody from there going to show up here and tell him he can't love this man the way he wants to. Except, he thinks, maybe himself. He sighs into his beer glass. Maybe he could have worked a little less hard at being so damn unbeatable. He isn't really looking forward to going ten rounds with himself over this. He'll do it, but god, he's gonna take a lot of hits. 

"Does it bother you?" Eliot asks finally, and he's been silent for so long that Hardison has given up and gone back to his work. "That I don't-- do all that. With you." 

Hardison sets his tools down again, and he's quiet for a long minute. "Honestly, man, yeah, sometimes. But maybe not for the reasons you think." 

"It isn't-- I don't-- I don't want you to think that I'm--" 

"Ashamed to be with me?" Hardison finishes, and Eliot nods. "Yeah, I don't think that. If it bothers me, Eliot, it's mostly just because I know what it feels like to try to put part of your heart in cold storage and just...pretend like it doesn't matter, that you're not all of yourself because you're a private person, or because it's nobody's business. And there's a lot of ways that it isn't anybody's business, but there's also a big difference between just being a private person who really feels that way, and feeling that way because that's how you were told you should feel. And you're the only person who knows which one you are for sure, but if it's the second one, man-- I don't want that for anybody, any queer person, anywhere. I definitely don't want it for someone I love." He sighs. "All that said, though, come out culture's bullshit, so, I'm not trying to say that there's something you _have_ to do. I just-- y'all are my people, and I love you, and sometimes it's hard for me not to let people see that." 

"You have to know that I-- that I'm happy," he says, when what he wanted to say was, _I love you_ , but this conversation is tough enough, surely, without throwing more feelings fuel on the damn fire. "With you and Parker, I'm happy. When it's just us, it's easy." 

Hardison nods. "I know. You don't have to tell me that it's easier in here." 

"How come you're so much better at this than me?" Eliot sighs. "I'm not trying to hand you baggage or whatever, but I know your Nana dragged you to church, we've talked about it." 

"Yeah, but my Nana also doesn't give a shit about queer stuff," Hardison says, smiling. "When I came out to her I was like fifteen, and I was so terrified, because you just never know, you know? But she just gave me a big hug and told me that as far as she was concerned God doesn't make mistakes, and whoever I was, that was exactly who I was supposed to be."

"Huh," Eliot says. 

He tries very hard to imagine anyone from the congregation of the First Baptist Church in his hometown saying something like that to anyone, especially to him. He comes up empty. That is not how that talk would have gone. Even if he'd had the vocabulary for this stuff at that age, which he very much didn't, the best possible outcome was that he'd get to leave town and never come back, which is the journey he went on anyway, but not in quite the same way. He watched more than one _different_ kid head out of town and fade away over his eighteen years there, and it was always the same. They'd leave, and their family would still be there, but for the most part nobody ever brought them up again, unless it was to say something like, _Jimmy? Oh, well, you know. He up and moved to **New York** a few years ago._ The destination changed-- sometimes it was L.A., or Las Vegas, or even just Dallas-- but the sentiment was always the same, and everybody shared the same knowing look about it. It occurs to him to wonder if anybody ever said that about him after he left, and he's almost sad to think that they probably didn't, because nobody really knew him like that. He barely knew himself that well. When it feels like your survival depends in large part on your ability to hold onto a certain amount of social currency, well, you do what you have to do. So he held all his cards pretty close to his chest, and maybe it's naive to think that nobody knew what his hand was, but this talent for conning people had to come from somewhere. Maybe it was all those years spent hiding in plain sight, learning how to be somebody who was still him, but not quite. It was safety, in a way, but it was a sacrifice, too. He isn't sure you get those parts of yourself back once you give them up, especially after all this time, but for Hardison, he is willing to try. 

But he doesn't really know how to explain all that, so all he says is, "Glad you had someone like that." 

"Me too," Hardison says, and then gestures between the two of them. "In case you're wondering, by the way, Nana's right. No mistakes here." 

"Yeah, well, mistakes or not, I think God gave up on me a while back," Eliot says, and drains the rest of his beer. "But at least I'm pretty sure lately it wasn't for this. That's a comfort." 

Parker's voice drifts down from the landing above them. "Anybody who gives up on you is an idiot," she says. 

"Parker, I don't know if you want to be calling God an idiot," Eliot frowns. "At the very least it seems like bad luck." 

"I don't believe in god," Parker says, shrugging. "And even if I did, I'm not going to be nice to someone who was mean to you." 

"I think we are about thirty seconds from a discussion on Parker using a taser on God," Hardison murmurs, "so maybe we should wrap this up for now." 

"Agreed," Eliot says. He eyes Parker where she's perched on the rail over the landing. It always makes him a little nervous when she does stuff like that, even though he knows that she'd probably just walk off the fall, because she's Parker. Still, there will always be a part of him that's waiting to catch her, just in case. "We'll be up there in a second," he tells her. 

"Okay," she says. "Hurry up, there's things I want to do." 

"We got you," Hardison says, and she nods and disappears for just a moment before swinging her head back over the railing. 

"I mean sex," she says. 

"We know," they confirm, and she smiles at them and bounces back through the door. 

"Rule one," Hardison says, and Eliot just laughs, grateful for the momentary relief from the tenseness of this conversation. "I don't really remember where we were, here, but I want you to know that I'm fine, and I will be fine, wherever you end up. I know it's a process." 

"I just don't know what you want," Eliot frowns. "I don't even know what I'm supposed to do." 

"There's not really a _supposed to_ , here. And it's not about what I want," Hardison says, shaking his head. "That's the whole thing. I just want _you_ to feel free to do what _you_ want to do, regardless of whether it's me or Parker you're standing next to out there."

"That's-- I understand what you're saying," he says. "It would still help me out if you could give me more of an idea, here. You want me to say something, if it comes up? You want me to what, hold your hand when we walk down the street? What?" 

"You could if you wanted," Hardison says easily. "I don't mind if my man holds my hand." 

"I'm just, I'm not--" 

"You're not there yet," Hardison murmurs. "Nobody said you had to be. Eliot, seriously, I wasn't trying to confuse the issue, I mean, yes, I'd love it if you felt like you were comfortable enough to walk down the street holding my hand. But that's me. It doesn't have to be you, and if it's not something you want or it's not something you're comfortable with, I will adjust. You don't have to be or do anything in particular, there's nobody standing around with a sign that says _must be this queer to ride this ride_." He pauses. "Well, okay. There are actually some people who do that. But those people aren't people we're gonna be spending time with anyway." 

"Yeah, well, I don't know how to be part of any of that," Eliot says. "All I know of this stuff is like, drag queens and rainbows and shit like that, and I can tell you right now with no exploration necessary that none of that is me." He jerks his thumb toward his chest. "This is me. And I ain't old but I'm not young enough to change all of this. So what if this is just sort of _it_ , for me?" 

"Again, you don't have to do anything. If just being with me and Parker is the maximum extent of queerness that you're comfortable expressing, that's totally fine. You don't have to go out and get an undercut and a bi flag tattoo to be queer enough. Although," Hardison says, with a slow smile and a look crossing his face that Eliot has come to know very well over the past several weeks, "if you did, I would support that, because it would be really hot. Mmm." 

"I'll keep that in mind," Eliot drawls, and there's a million other things he wants to ask, but even though Hardison is perfectly willing to have these talks he feels like he can't just rely on Hardison to be some kind of guide to his world of whatever kind of queer he is. Most of that work is his, and it sucks, but he'll do it. Just not tonight. Tonight, Parker's been left alone upstairs too long already, and there is, after all, only one rule for this relationship. So he stands and nods in the direction of their apartment and holds out his hand to Hardison, saying, "Come on. We should probably wrap this up for now. Don't want to leave her waiting too long."

"A patient woman, she is not," Hardison agrees, and takes his hand, and that part of this is nice and easy, at least. The rest of it he'll sort out as he can. Slow and steady. One way or another, it'll be all right. 

+

**Thursday, March 26th, 2013**

**_The Fulcrum-- Happy Hour Cocktail Special_**

_**Sloe & Steady **  
Sloe gin, blood orange brandy, house simple syrup, & lime juice. Easy does it. _

"That is a very good drink," Hardison says. He meets Eliot's eyes over the rim of his glass. "Not a bad way to look at some self-exploration, either, maybe?" 

"Yeah, well, everybody needs a little reminder of that now and again," Eliot says. He holds up his beer, and they clink glasses.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's a couple of references in this chapter to some Jason Isbell lyrics from two different songs-- "Last of My Kind" and "Tupelo," both off _The Nashville Sound_ , which I would say is his best album, except that I've heard _Reunions_. (And if you want an Eliot Spencer song, "River" on that album? Is IT.)


	3. the devereaux.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Life isn't all restaurants and relationships. Some of it's Leverage, and they do need a new team.

Life isn't all restaurants and relationships and trying to sort out who the hell he is and how the hell to be okay with that in front of people who aren't Hardison and Parker. Some of life is also Leverage, International, Inc., and their plans for it. 

They agree that despite Hardison's initial proposal, which was to dump the whole _evil drive of evil_ , as Parker's taken to calling it, onto the dark web and see who bites, they should probably start small and expand from there. So what they need first, now that they have a home base that involves a legitimate side business, is basically a full new team-- with the stipulation that Parker's the only brains. 

"We only need one person in charge, and that's you," Hardison says. 

"Yeah. Too many cooks, otherwise," Eliot agrees. 

"Okay," Parker says. "Let's find the rest of them." 

Grifter, hacker, hitter, thief. They agree that Parker may be in charge but the three of them know their own shit best, so Parker's got the thief, Hardison finds the hacker, and Eliot thinks long and hard about another hitter. After a couple of months reading through Hardison's compiled lists and dossiers on every possible criminal on the planet who might agree to this idea, in early April, they make their choices and compare notes. 

Parker starts. 

"So. Our new thief. Her name's Jess," Parker says, nodding at Hardison. A series of photos and other documents detailing a long list of stolen merch pop up on the screen, along with what is obviously an FBI file photograph of a young Black woman. "She usually steals jewelry, but she specializes in stealing trade secrets." 

"What, like the secret formula for Coca-Cola?" Eliot asks. 

"Yeah, we're pretty sure she stole that, actually," Hardison says. "There's a rumor that she has some things that belong to Monsanto, too, and their security makes Coca-Cola's look like they're guarded by the Boy Scouts." 

"Damn," Eliot says, whistling. "That's not easy." 

"Nope," Parker says. "That's why she's my pick." She gestures at the screen, wiggling her fingers. "Voila. Our new thief. Jess." 

"Just Jess?" Eliot asks. "What, is it a thief thing that you only have one name?" 

Parker smiles. "I can neither confirm nor deny that this is a thief thing." 

"She does have a last name," Hardison says, shaking his head at them. "It's Williams. But she keeps it a secret, at least from most people. Not from me, though. Nobody hides much from me." 

Eliot frowns. "She running from something?" 

"Her mama, probably," Hardison laughs, and calls up some more photos. "Meet the Williams family. Her mom's a high school principal, dad's a dentist, and she has two younger siblings that probably think all that nice jewelry comes from how hard she's working to save money and not from some _very_ clever heists." 

"If I were stealing from Monsanto I'd want to keep my family out of it, too," Eliot says. "Good choice, Parker." 

"Thanks," she says, smiling at him. "Your turn." 

Hardison grins. "Yeah, who's our new Mister Punchy Hands?" 

"That's _Miss_ Punchy Hands," Eliot corrects, and continues, "Dani Serrano." Hardison types some things, and a few seconds later her photo appears. "Officially, she's a boxer, and a good one-- started fighting at home in gyms in Puerto Rico and then New York when she was twelve, holds world titles across five different weight classes, and she's done some MMA. I've seen her fight. She's good. Unofficially," he says, as the images onscreen change, "she's done some jobs off and on with some friends of mine. Once took out like, twelve Russians with a bottle of Gatorade."

"How-- " Hardison starts to say, and then shakes his head. "Mm-mmm. Don't want to know that." 

"Are you sure?" Eliot asks. "Because she took the cap and jammed it--" 

"Nope," Hardison interrupts. "I vote yes on Dani, Parker, what do you say on Dani, okay, she nodded, moving on." 

Eliot chuckles as Hardison shifts gears as quickly as possible to tell them about their hacker. 

"Let me introduce y'all to Mister Nishant Gupta," Hardison says. "Goes by Nish. You might know him better as the guy who hacked Eurovision last year." 

Parker frowns. "Eurovision? Is that that thing you made me watch with all the weird stuff?" 

"That doesn't narrow it down at all," Eliot jokes, winking at Parker. 

"You know what, I share my life with you people, and this is what I get," Hardison grumbles. 

"Love, pancakes, and all the sex you can handle," Eliot says. "Tough life you lead." 

"Hmm. Very tough. Tell us about Nish," Parker says. 

Hardison gestures to the screen, which now shows some news articles and a photo of a South Asian man holding a cell phone and grinning. "Born and raised in London, he is a true man after my own heart and he hacked MI6 when he was fifteen. Also hacked Interpol a few times and took over the British House of Commons website a few years ago to include an entire fake office for Harriet Jones, MP, Flydale North." 

"That's a _Doctor Who_ reference," Parker tells Eliot. 

"Great," Eliot grumbles. "Two big nerds. Just what we need around here." 

"What age is it?" Hardison grins. 

"Age of the geek. We know," Parker and Eliot say together, and Hardison just laughs. 

"That's right," he says, and sets his keyboard down. "So. Last one. Who's it gonna be?" 

They all just look at each other for a minute, because the grifter is the hardest pick, was always going to be the hardest pick, and none of them really have a clue, they just know none of them can do it. Parker's gotten so much better after years of working with Sophie, learning from Sophie, learning from Tara, but it's never her first instinct, and she's got her hands full calling the plays now anyway. Eliot's not bad on the con, but his idea of getting information out of people in a tight spot does frequently still involving punching, and Hardison still thinks the Ice Man was the world's greatest diamond thief name. So yeah. They need a new grifter. 

But how the hell do you replace Sophie Devereaux? 

"I don't think we _can_ replace her," Hardison says, after an hour of debate that gets them nowhere. "We have to stop thinking about it like that or we're never going to get anywhere. We have all these names narrowed down to three. Somebody just needs to pick one." 

"You're the brains," Eliot says to Parker. "It's your play. Call it." 

"Ryan," Parker says, and they both nod at her. 

"Okay," Hardison says, and calls up some data. It's mostly articles, headlines, there's no photo. "Ryan Carter. No known photos, but from other people's descriptions, we think they're white, tall, probably wear glasses, and they usually have purple hair." 

Eliot frowns for a second about that description, but he doesn't say anything. One of the many things he's learned from listening to Hardison, and spending time in the bar with some of the restaurant staff, is that gender is a much more complicated proposition than his limited learning on the topic had allowed for him to understand. And while he has a lot of questions and he's still learning about all this crap, nobody had to tell him not to be a dick about what people like to be called, at least. 

Hardison's still telling them both about Ryan, so he tries to tune back in. "What we do know-- originally from Alabama, but bounced around most of the world the last couple of years. At the tender of age of eighteen, they famously convinced a group of Russian dignitaries that they'd located the heir of the lost Romanov princess, Anatasia. They have also conned the U.S. Navy into buying a non-existent fleet of spy ships, and, if rumors are true, which I believe that they are because I found the bill of sale, they also once managed to actually sell oceanfront property in Arizona to the Governor of Georgia." 

"That's a song," Eliot laughs. "Not a grift." 

"Well, apparently they did it," Hardison says. 

"Did they throw the Golden Gate in free?" Eliot asks. 

"I'm sure Ryan would be glad for you to ask them," Hardison says. 

Eliot chuckles. Whoever they are, Ryan does sound like they've got a good sense of humor, anyway. 

"Well? Is this our team?" Parker asks, and Hardison presses a button that pulls all four faces-- well, three and a description of one-- back onto the screens. 

They all give everybody one last look. Hitter, hacker, grifter, thief. 

"Yeah," they all say together, and Parker nods. 

"Then let's go steal a bunch of thieves," she grins. 

+

**Saturday, April 6th, 2013**

_**The Fulcrum-- Happy Hour Cocktail Special** _

**The Devereaux**. _Local small batch vodka, elderflower cordial, housemade hibiscus & lavender syrup, squeeze of lemon, & prosecco. Drink responsibly, and keep an eye on your wallet._

"I'm mad at you for this," Parker says, punching Eliot on the arm after she sets down her drink.

"Ow, Parker," he complains, rubbing his bicep. She really does have a good right hook, even sitting down on a barstool and leaning halfway out of her seat. He probably shouldn't have showed her that. "What the hell was that for?" 

"This drink," she says. She wiggles her fingers over the glass. " _The Devereaux_." 

"You didn't like it?" 

"I love it!" she half-shouts, and he takes a step back from the bar. "I love it, and I miss Sophie now, and your drink made me sad, and I'm mad about it." 

"Wow," he says. 

"Why did you make this?" she demands. 

Eliot shrugs. "You're not the only one who misses people sometimes, Parker." 

"Oh," she says. She fiddles with the lemon twist garnish on her drink.

He leans against the bar. "It's gonna work," he says. "You're good at this. You know that, right?" 

"Yeah," she says. "But don't make any more sad drinks." 

"Yes ma'am," he says, and she smiles.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The song Eliot's referencing in the bit about Ryan's con is "Ocean Front Property," by George Strait.


	4. cascadian charcuterie.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It hasn't exactly escaped his notice that a lot of the bar's staff are gay as a maypole.

It's good that they're ready to go recruit their new team members, because Eliot knows that Hardison and Parker are getting restless. He can see it every time they happen to go anywhere and Parker spends a few seconds longer than she needs to watching some moderately well-dressed guy pull out his wallet to pay for overpriced coffee, or Hardison looks longingly at some piece of tech, reaches for his phone, and then sighs a little and puts it back in his pocket. So yeah. They need a job. As for himself, though, despite the fact that he hasn't hit anybody in a couple of weeks and he's still on some kind of goddamn journey of self-discovery, he's really just enjoying life.

First of all, the restaurant's sort of breaking even, which in the restaurant business is an actual miracle. The people who come in here most always leave happy, they love his food, they love their beer, and while the staff are probably always going to look to Hardison first, because he's funny and charming and he signs their paychecks, Eliot thinks they might be warming up to him, too. That isn't even something he thought he cared about, but lately he's been filling in here and there, and he's found he actually looks forward to seeing them all every day. He doesn't know everybody that well yet, but there's people he likes, and all of them happen to fall somewhere on the _not straight_ part of the whole sexuality thing. 

There's Jordan, their bar manager, who looks a lot like a younger version of that guy they helped with the missing Van Gogh and who definitely spent some time in the service. Eliot could tell by his walk. The guy runs the bar more efficiently than some drill sergeants and has correct opinions on knives, and they have traded some stories after hours and places they've been stationed. They talk about the things they've seen without actually talking about it all, and sometimes his boyfriend, Cal, who used to be in the Air Force, joins them. If Jordan and Cal have figured out that there are no straight people present for those little after-hours former military meetups, they haven't let on, which he is silently grateful for, even if sometimes he can see space in those conversations that Hardison would easily fill. Because Cal loves video games like Hardison does, and Jordan loves making fun of him for it in much the same way that Eliot loves giving Hardison shit. And one of these days, Eliot is just going to open his mouth and say, "Tell you what, if you want some competition, my man's the best Black Ops player on the planet," and honestly, he doesn't even think Cal will miss a beat before he says, "Well, I'm always up for a challenge." 

There's also Kat, the server with the eighteen piercings and hair that changes color weekly, who, when they discovered that Eliot actually spoke pretty good Korean for a white guy, spent an hour after a shift one night talking to him about Korean cuisine and how the kimchi on the menu was like, okay?, but could be a lot better, to be honest. "This is pogi kimchi the way my grandma taught me to make it," they said the next time they came in for a shift, and handed him some tupperware. "So, you know, the one true correct way." He's not gonna argue with their grandma. It's fucking delicious kimchi. 

And there's Brady, a chubby white kid who's trying to work her way through college on server's wages but who still puts back a little of her tip money to buy tickets to Portland Thorns games, because she swears _this is the women's soccer league that is actually gonna make it for real, wait and see_. Once she figures out that Eliot isn't going to be shitty about women's sports, she gives him an update every week on how the weekend's matches went, and he may have promised to go to a game at some point. He does appreciate women's soccer. He has a feeling he and Brady may appreciate it for similar reasons beyond just a good game, too, if the dreamy look she gets when she talks about some of the players is any indication. 

So, yeah. It hasn't exactly escaped his notice that a lot of the Fulcrum's staff are gay as a maypole. It's still a little jarring to include himself-- even privately in his own head-- in their number, sometimes, but just spending time in the restaurant with all of them is a help. He's learning to see people beyond tired old stereotypes. He's learning to see a little of himself in those people. He still feels like he missed out on too much shit to ever really catch up, and he doesn't really know how he fits into the wider world of queer people, or even if he fits into it at all. But he's not running for the hills, and that's something. 

Now if he could just get certain members of the U.S. armed forces to stop fucking calling and trying to guilt him back into service, things would really be just peachy. 

"Jesus," he swears, as his phone rings for what feels like the tenth time in two days. Vance again. Probably the same job he already turned down twice. He lets it go to voicemail. He has work to do. 

A big group comes in while the host is seating another table, so he does what needs doing and welcomes people, seats them, passes out some menus, and gratefully surrenders them to Kat when they come along. Their hair is sort of a shimmery pink this week.

"This is Kat," he tells the group. "They'll be taking care of you." 

"Thanks," Kat says, and he just nods at them and ducks back into the kitchen. 

The rest of lunch service speeds by in a rush of orders. He gets two more damn phone calls from Vance, which he continues to mostly ignore, aside from the few seconds he gets to pull out his phone and send a text that says, _I told you I don't work for you anymore_ , and then has to jump back into making burgers and he can't think about whatever that is anymore, or feel any residual guilt over not taking these calls. 

He's on his way back from a quick break when Kat catches him in the hall. 

"Hey," Kat says, just before he gets to the doors. "Can I talk to you for a second?" 

"Something wrong?" he asks, shifting around. "That group of college guys in your section give you shit about something? You need me to talk to them?" 

Kat sort of half smiles at him. "You know your face does this really scary thing sometimes, right? Like, don't get me wrong, we all know we could do worse than having a manager who would throw down for us if he needed to, but-- you could take it down a few notches." 

"Uh, I'll work on that," he assures them. He tries to look less...scary. Whatever. "Was there something you needed?" 

"Yeah, um, I don't usually do this," they go on to say, "because normally it's not something that I think deserves thanks, but-- thanks for being cool, about my pronouns? I get the impression that maybe you don't _get it_ but you just respect it anyway, which is, like, cool, so...just, thanks." 

"Um. Yeah. You're right, you don't need to thank me," Eliot says, and he means it. "I don't have to get what that means to you to get that it means something. I know what people call themselves matters." 

"Not everyone's a good ally," Kat shrugs. "The last place I worked definitely-- it wasn't great. So I just wanted to say that I appreciate it." 

He frowns. They're not wrong, is the thing, he doesn't really get it. But at least he understands what a name means, especially when it's the wrong one. How it just doesn't sit right, doesn't feel like it belongs to you, like whoever said it must be talking to someone who isn't there and not you. It isn't at all the same as whatever this means to Kat, probably, but there's a reason, in a world of criminals and other people who usually go by their last names first and their first names last, if ever at all, he is always Eliot, and never Spencer. You won't ever catch him saying the words _Mister Spencer was my father_ , because it's a fucking tired-ass cliche and this is not some goddamn mid-June Father's Day television special about fathers and sons, but it's also not _not_ the truth of his life, so there's that. And he spent enough time in the military hearing his last name directed at him like it was the only one he had, and maybe time and repetition wore down his resistance to it but it was never really _his_. He's just Eliot. So if Kat wants people to say they and them because that's what sounds right in their ears, then it's not really his business to say otherwise, and if he catches anyone giving them shit about it, it'll be a bad day for that person. 

"Yeah, well, if anyone around here gives you shit about it, you can tell them to talk to me," he says. "There might not be a lot of talking, but they won't bother you again." He pauses and tries to assess what his face is doing. "That probably didn't come out any less scary, huh." 

They shake their head, but they're laughing. "Yeah, I don't think you tried at all." 

"Old habits," he shrugs, and that's true enough. But although the habits may be old, his world has a whole lot of new people in it. He hopes he's doing right by them.

+

**Friday, April 5th, 2013**

**_The Fulcrum-- Bar Menu_ **  
**Cascadian charcuterie.** _House made boar & apple sausage, smoked salmon, and a rotating selection of local cheese, pickles, & jam. A celebration of local food-- because everybody brings something different to the table._

"Hey, can you two come here for a second?" Eliot calls, waving Kat and Brady over to the bar. He sets a wooden serving dish in front of them covered with meat and cheese and fruit. "I'm working on a charcuterie board. What do you think?" 

"Oh, wow," Brady says. She goes immediately for some of the goat cheese, while Kat reaches for the fish.

"Smoked salmon on a charcuterie board?" Kat asks. "Different, but nice."

"Thought it might be nice to play our local strengths," Eliot says. "We needed better bar snacks. I gotta think of a few more things eventually but I thought this might be a good start." 

"Hmmm. If only I knew someone who had menu ideas," Brady says, meaningfully, with a sideways look at Kat. 

"Yeah, wow, that would be really helpful, I guess," Kat says. Their cheeks are slightly pink. 

"Okay," Eliot says, looking between them. "What?" 

There's a long pause. Brady stares at Kat. Kat stares at the charcuterie board. Eliot just looks confused. 

"Kat wants to open a restaurant," Brady blurts out finally.

" _Brady_ ," Kat says. 

"What? You weren't going to say it," Brady says. "You make really good food!" 

"Well, I can't argue with that," Eliot says, thinking of the kimchi. "What kind of place do you want to open?" 

"Uh-- probably Korean-influenced, somehow, but I don't know," Kat says. "Fusion stuff is probably overdone at this point, but I want to do it differently. It just seems like the most popular fusion cuisine places are always just like, a white guy and a dream, you know?" They bite their lip. "Uh, no offense." 

"None taken," he shrugs. "And I don't think it's overdone. I mean, you haven't done it. And you're the only person who can make what you want to make." 

Kat looks a little like they want to melt into the floor, but also a little proud. "I just want to make people love the food I grew up eating," they sigh. 

"Makes sense to me," Eliot says. "And I've only eaten one thing you made, but I'd eat at your place." 

"See," Brady says, elbowing Kat, who mostly ignores them, except for a very small smile that they probably think the other two don't see. 

"Well, thanks, but anyway, I don't actually know anything about menus," they continue. "I mean, I know how to make one, I just don't know that I'm making one that will make money. I've been a server at probably a thousand restaurants, so I know the staff side of restaurant management, and I know how to make good food, but all I know about the business side is that margins are really thin and most restaurants fail. I keep trying to go to school but like, ha, money, time, whatever." They take another piece of salmon. "I don't know why I'm telling you all of this." 

Eliot, who once stood in a restaurant kitchen in Belgium and said a lot more personal stuff than this, just smiles. "School's good," he says, "but if you want some practical experience for now, let me know." 

"What?" 

Eliot shrugs. "You got something you want to put on the menu, we'll do it. With your name on it. And we can walk you through the supply stuff and the finances. Not gonna say I know everything but you're welcome to what I do know." 

"Seriously?" 

"Seriously," he nods. "I don't joke about food. And don't give me that look like I don't have to do this, I know that. But everybody starts somewhere. I wouldn't be here if somebody hadn't given me a shot." 

"Um," they say. "I mean, when...?" 

"No time like the present," he shrugs, and they smile nervously. 

"Okay. Um. I might have some notes. In my bag. In a notebook. That I'm just going to...go get. Right now." 

"You know where to find me," he says. 

"That was very cool of you," Brady says approvingly, as Kat heads into the back of the restaurant in search of their bag and notes. 

"I get one right every now and again," Eliot says. He pretends to scowl. "Don't tell anybody." 

"Yeah, you're fooling like, nobody with that," Brady says. She scrapes the rest of the goat cheese up with a cracker, holds it up like she's toasting with it, and grins. "But I'll keep your secret."


	5. sunday roast fries.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As spring starts to move through Portland, they start collecting their new team members.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW: Please note! This chapter has a very brief amount of canon-typical violence.

As spring starts to move through Portland, they start collecting their new team members. Or at least they will. First they have to decide how to recruit them. 

They talk about going through back channels, sending messages, the way they were all hired so long ago, for the very first job. But that just doesn't feel like the right way to go about it. 

"It has to be in person," Parker says. "It's like when we went to get Sophie. Dubenich didn't pick her. Nate picked her. And we picked them." 

"So let's go get 'em," Hardison says. 

"Yeah," Eliot says, "that's the right way to do it, but we'll have to find them first."

"Oh ye of little faith," Hardison says. "I can find these people in an afternoon, baby. Not even a problem." 

Hardison probably couldn't have given them a better chance to mess with him if he'd gift-wrapped it, and they're not going to pass that up, so Eliot and Parker look at each other and then back at Hardison, just staring and waiting for him to react. 

"What?" Hardison asks. "You think I can't, is that what that look is for?" 

They don't say anything. Eliot shrugs and raises his eyebrows, and Parker just leans over until her shoulder is resting against Eliot's, and they both just keep staring. 

"Oh, it is _on_ ," Hardison says, picking up his keyboard. "I cannot believe the level of disrespect-- you know, I am gonna find these people in no time. No time at all. And when I'm done y'all are gonna spend all night making this up to me." 

Neither of them say anything in response to this, but when Eliot holds his hand out Parker slaps it, and then they grin at each other. 

"Y'all are lucky you're cute," Hardison grumbles. "And I am making a list of the ways you can make this up to me." 

Eliot leans closer to Parker. "Do you want to tell him that's why we do this, or should I?" 

"Yeah, but we also do it just because it's fun," she points out. "Should we tell him that?" 

"He's pretty smart. He'll work it out," he says. 

"Unbelievable," Hardison says, and they leave him to his work. 

They're in the kitchen, making pizza for dinner, when Hardison finds them a while later. 

Well. Eliot's making pizza. Parker's just making off with all the cheese. 

"Victory is mine," Hardison declares, and taps his watch. "Three hours, twenty-seven minutes, and four seconds. Everybody's whereabouts accounted for, plane tickets purchased, the whole thing." 

"Wow. You must have been very motivated," Parker says. 

"Wonder why that was," Eliot says. 

Parker shrugs and steals the mozzarella. "We may never know for sure." 

"Oh, I will be happy to break it down for you, don't worry about that," Hardison says, stepping over to wrap his arms around Parker from behind. He pulls her back from the counter, away from the cheese, and kisses the side of her neck. 

Eliot watches them for a minute and then takes advantage of this distraction and steals the cheese back so he can finish the pizza and get it in the oven. Parker makes a face at him. "There's a cheese to sauce ratio, Parker, I keep telling you," he says, and then smirks at Hardison. "So what's on your list?" 

Hardison just smiles. "We can get to that after dinner. Y'all are gonna need your strength." 

+

Thanks to Hardison's highly motivated searching, they head off a few days later to try and convince a bunch of criminals to be good guys for a while. 

In New York City, they find their thief. Well, Parker finds her, because she's hanging upside down off a beam inside the elevator shaft of the Met. Hardison and Eliot watch and listen from the relative safety of Lucille. 

"I still don't know how she just does that," Hardison says, as Parker gleefully flies down an elevator shaft with nothing but some rigging to support her. 

They don't stop looking at Parker, but they do bump their fists together. 

The screen displaying Parker's button cam shifts suddenly so that it's upside down, and they see their thief.

"Hi," Parker says. From the way the camera shakes, Eliot's guessing she's waving. "Jess, right?" 

"Uh, yeah. But if you're here about the Tiffany necklace, you're too late," Jess says. She looks suspicious and skeptical as hell."Otherwise, hi, I guess." 

"I'm not here for the necklace, I'm here to meet you, actually," Parker replies. They see Parker's hand extending a business card, which Jess doesn't reach for until Parker continues, "My name's Parker." 

"Oh damn," Jess replies, and then they see her take the card and look it over. " _The_ Parker? Did you really steal the Polar Star?" 

"Yep," Parker says. The camera sways a little, like Parker is swinging from the beam. "Did you really steal the secret recipe for Coca-Cola?" 

"Maybe," Jess replies, in a voice that indicates that she most certainly did. "Trade secrets and jewelry, that's my game. The secrets are just fun to know. The jewelry, well. I like a little extra sparkle. You get it." 

"Yeah. I put all my jewelry on our Christmas tree," Parker tells her. "Very sparkly." 

"That's...weird," Jess says. 

"See," Eliot says, on coms, while Hardison just laughs. "I told you." 

Parker ignores them. "That's okay," she says to Jess. "Do you have something else lined up after this?" 

"I don't know," Jess sighs. "There's a new exhibit at the MoMa but art's just really boring to steal. And it takes up too much space to store." 

" _That's_ weird," Parker says, and Jess shrugs. "There's a time and location on that card. Meet us there if you're interested."

"Us?" 

"Leverage," Parker says, a smile in her voice. She flips around and hops onto the top of the elevator that Hardison has sent up, and if the curious, interested look they can see on Jess's face is any indication, this first mission was a success. 

+++

For their hacker, they head to London. Parker stays home, telling them she wants to do some more planning for the job she wants to pull when the team is assembled finally, which leaves him and Hardison to get this one done on their own.

They find Nish Gupta in a cafe in the West End. A little "accidental" bumping against the guy and a cloned cell phone later, he's dropping into a chair across from them at the table they're sharing. 

"I don't know who you are," Nish says, setting his phone on the table and pointing to it, "but you hacked _my_ phone, which is basically impossible, so there's a really short list of people you could be." 

"Who do you think we are?" Eliot asks, looking over at Hardison and back at Nish. 

"Well, you're not British intelligence," he says thoughtfully. "Not Interpol. Not American intelligence, since that doesn't exist." 

Eliot makes a face. "You sure about this guy, Hardison?" he asks, and he only gets a smile from Hardison in return. 

"Holy shit," Nish says, staring. " _Alec Hardison_? Are you serious?" 

"You know him?" Eliot asks, doing his best to stomp down on the proud smile that's threatening to spread over his face. 

"Know him?" Nish says. He starts listing off Hardison's accomplishments like some people recite sports stats. "Hacked the Pentagon at twelve, first guy to crack the Tanuki system, there's even a rumor you took down a _Steranko_. Honestly, man, you're a fucking legend. Also, that's a really nice bowtie." 

"Thanks," Hardison grins, reaching up to adjust the item in question just slightly. "Bowties are cool." 

Nish gasps, much like Hardison does when someone makes some reference to some weird thing he likes, and Eliot sighs inwardly. At least this guy seems less annoying than Chaos. 

"Is this one of your nerd things?" Eliot asks. "Is that why you wore that today?" 

"It's _Doctor Who_ , Eliot, we've been over this," Hardison says. He slides one of their cards across the table to Nish. "Allons-y," he grins. 

"Oh my god, this is the coolest thing that's ever happened to me," Nish says, staring at the card. 

"You both need to get out more," Eliot grumbles. 

"Ignore this man," Hardison tells Nish. He nods at the card. "Just wanted to drop that off. Hope we see you around." 

"Wait, at least tell me this before you leave-- is the Steranko rumor true?" Nish asks, as they get up to leave. "Did your crew really crack one of those once?" 

"No," Hardison says. He winks at Eliot, then looks back at Nish. "We cracked it twice." 

Nish looks like he might just fall out, and Eliot doesn't actually bother to hide his smile as he and Hardison head for the door.

+++

Their hitter is at a gym in L.A., and she is exactly as good as Eliot told them she was. 

It's just him and Parker for this particular recruitment trip-- Hardison hangs back in Portland because he's got some kind of online video game tournament that apparently he can't miss, which Parker and Eliot mock him pretty mercilessly about, but he just pushes them out of the apartment and tells them to enjoy each other's company. 

When they get to the gym, Eliot clocks about six guys in the parking lot who are definitely not here to visit the nail salon next door. 

Parker sees them, too. "What's that about?" she asks. 

"Triads," he says, looking at the suits and the cleavers they are not bothering to hide very well. "Pretty sure they're not here for us, so it's a good bet they're here for her." 

"Should we warn her?" Parker asks, and Eliot shakes his head. 

"If half of what we know about her is true, she already knows," he says, and sure enough, when Dani steps out of the gym a few minutes later, gym bag slung over one shoulder and phone in her hand, she may look distracted, but Eliot can see in the line of her shoulders that she's not. 

"She's good," he tells Parker, who just nods. The guys start to move in, not at all subtle about it. "I'm gonna go give her a hand, though." 

"I'm guessing you don't want me to handle this with my taser," Parker sighs, as he reaches for the door handle. 

"I do not," he tells her. He opens the car door about thirty seconds before the fighting starts. "Be right back."

They jump as soon as Dani gets to her car, six guys and a lot of knives. She sighs like this is the least impressive display of force she's ever seen, which, given what he knows about the jobs she's worked lately, is probably true. 

"You want a hand?" he calls, and she just shrugs. 

"Your funeral, man," she says, and shoves her gym bag into the closest guy's face, twists the strap around his neck, and slams his head into her knee. 

"Not today," he tells her, ducking a couple of knives and catching one of the guys full in the face with his elbow.

Less than ten minutes later, six guys are unconscious and tied up on the hood of a police cruiser outside a McDonald's on the other side of the parking lot, and they're headed back to their respective vehicles.

"What'd you do to piss off the Triads?" Eliot asks. 

She snorts. "What _didn't_ I do to piss off the Triads?" 

"Well, can't say I don't know what that feels like," Eliot says. 

"Yeah, got that impression from the way you fight," she says, and holds out her hand. "Thanks for the assist. I don't say this a lot, but you're pretty good. Do I know you?" 

"We have some mutual friends in Guaynabo," he says, taking her hand briefly. "I was hoping you might be interested in a job." 

"Mm. I've got a tournament coming up, so I don't know," she says. She cocks her head to the side. "But-- if I was interested in whatever job you've got-- you got a name I can run by our mutual friends in Guaynabo?"

"Eliot Spencer," he says, and yeah, okay, he's a little gratified when her eyebrows go up and her mouth drops open. 

"Shit," she says. "Seriously?" 

He just nods. 

"Damn. You're like, _known_ , man. What the fuck kind of job are you pulling that _you_ need an extra hitter?" 

He hands her the card with the Leverage, Inc., International logo and address on it. "Come find out," he says, and heads back to the car. He finds Parker in the driver's seat, but he just shakes his head, and she rolls her eyes and climbs back to the passenger side. 

"Maybe one of the new people will appreciate my driving skills," she sighs. 

"None of them seem like they have a death wish, so I doubt that," he tells her. "Anyway, I think she's in." 

Parker smiles, and he starts the car. "Three down, one to go." 

+++

That just leaves their grifter. They've all had sort of a silent agreement that they won't bother Sophie or Nate, because they're determined to do this on their own, but that doesn't apply to other grifters of their acquaintance. So they reach out to Tara, and she laughs and gives them some leads and some advice on what to say when they get there. Her advice does involve Sophie, but it doesn't involve talking to Sophie, so they feel like it's in the spirit of their unspoken rule. 

No one they know has actually seen Ryan in person, but they are reliably informed by Tara that what they've heard is probably right, and they're definitely looking for a taller person, white, usually wearing glasses and sporting some kind of short haircut, probably in some kind of purple color. And Ryan Carter, when they find them, does in fact match this description. They are posted up at a country estate in Northern Italy, where they are lounging on a chaise longue and literally being fed grapes by a butler. Yeah, that's a grifter, all right. 

The team is introduced to _Count Percival de Chenonceau of Genovia_ , and the Count-- or Ryan-- waves, and the butler disappears. 

In a very good Swiss accent, Ryan asks, "To what do we owe this pleasure, Madame and Monsieur?" 

"Lady Charlotte Prentice sends her regards," Parker says, and instantly, Ryan's whole face and posture changes. 

"Well I'll be damned," they say, and although the vowels and cadences of Alabama and Oklahoma speech do not sound even remotely the same to the discerning ear, god, that accent really does tug at parts of Eliot's heart. "A legend like that sends someone to your door, you listen. What can I do for y'all?" 

Parker extends a card, and they take it, flipping it back and forth in their hand. "We're just here with an invitation," she says, and they nod slowly. 

"Interesting," they say. "Y'all got names, or do I have to guess?' 

They introduce themselves briefly, just names, no other explanation. Parker goes first, then Hardison, then Eliot. 

"All right," Ryan says, narrowing their eyes at Eliot and tapping their ear. "You know I gotta ask-- where you from?" 

"Oklahoma," he says, because they are in fact obligated to ask. You hear somebody whose speech sounds even a little off from the Standard American Non-Accent, you ask. 

"Oh yeah? What part?" 

"South central," he says, and they motion for him to continue, so he adds, "Garvin County." 

"Damn, really? I got family in Wynnewood," they say, and his eyes widen. 

"No shit?" 

"Yep," they answer, and add with a laugh, "Not that I visit much. Nothing to do in Oklahoma." 

"Yeah, well," he smirks, crossing his arms over his chest, "I don't ever visit Alabama, either, since there's nothing to see."

"That hurts me, Oklahoma," they say. "Except it doesn't, because our football team is vastly superior to yours." 

"Don't start that shit, we're not even in the same conference," he grouses. 

"I don't mean to break up the family reunion, because this is truly fascinating," Hardison says, "but we did what we came to do, and we do have a plane to catch." 

"Well, thanks for stopping by," Ryan drawls. "Give my regards to her Ladyship." 

"Of course," Parker says, then shakes her head and gives them a curt little bow. "Your Highness," she adds, smiling, and heads for the door. Eliot and Hardison follow her out. 

Eliot waves over his shoulder. "See you around, Alabama," he calls. 

+  
Sunday, April 14th, 2013

_**The Fulcrum--Brunch Special** _

**Sunday Roast Fries.** _Gravy, slow-cooked roast beef, carrots, and Walla Walla onions served over fresh cut fries._

"This is incredible," Hardison tells Eliot, who smiles and reaches over and snags a fry of his own. 

"Hmm," he says thoughtfully. "Yeah. It is, huh." 

"Where'd this idea come from?" Hardison asks. 

"Felt like bringing something from home to the menu," Eliot shrugs. 

"In that case, I am revising my opinion of Oklahoma," Hardison says. "It is possibly--" 

"Don't say it," Eliot growls.

" _Okay_ ," Hardison grins, and when Eliot puts his head in his hands, Hardison chuckles and adds, "Hey, you not-legally-married me, man. Too late now." 

"Don't I know it," Eliot mutters. 

"Tell me about the roast," Hardison says, snagging another fry. 

"My granny used to make a roast every Sunday. You'd come in after church and the whole house smelled like heaven. With a real Sunday roast you'd cook the potatoes in with everything else, but I figured I'd try to make it pub food friendly. Serve it over fries. Seems like I did all right," he says, as Hardison shovels a whole forkful of fries and carrots and beef into his mouth. 

"Mmm. Yeah, you crushed it," Hardison says, when he finally finishes chewing. "Thank you, and thanks to your grandma."


	6. the kids are alright.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The bar gets an invitation, and so does Eliot.

As lunch service winds down on what has proven to be a very busy Sunday after they get back from their recruiting trips, Eliot stands up from behind the bar to find two people standing at the bar in front of him, smiling nervously. One of them, a short Latino man with impeccably styled hair and wearing a bright pink denim jacket covered in enamel pins, gives him a little wave, while the other, a white gal with a big silver nose ring and dark brown hair down to her waist, sticks her hand over the bar for him to shake. 

"Hi," she says, as he tentatively takes her hand. Her arm is covered in tattoos, a sleeve of swirling pink, blue, and purple stars. "I'm Lisha, and this is Javi." 

"Eliot. Pleased to meet you?" he says, a little confused but shaking their hands anyway. "Sorry, what's this about?" 

"Uh-- Kat sent us and said we should talk to you," Javi tells him, looking sideways at Lisha, suddenly uncertain. "Did they not tell you we were coming?"

"No," Eliot says, "but we've been pretty slammed since lunch started, none of us have had a chance to do much except run food and take orders, so I haven't really talked to them today." 

"Oh," Javi says, relaxing. "Sorry to spring this on you, then." 

"We're with the Portland Equality Board," Lisha tells him. 

Eliot nods slowly. They must be here for Leverage, although come to think of it, it's strange that Parker isn't already aware of it if they are, and he can't help but feel like he's missing something as he gestures to a table by the windows. "Okay. Uh, well, why don't we sit down and you can tell me who took what and I'll figure out how we can help." 

Lisha and Javi exchange a look. 

"Oh my god," Lisha laughs. "You are _exactly_ how Kat described you." 

"The _intensity_ ," says Javi, placing his hand on his chest. "They may have understated that, wow." 

"We're not here for-- I'm honestly not sure what you think we're here for," Lisha says. 

"Okay, then, I'm honestly not sure I'm understanding what's going on here," Eliot replies. "What's this about?" 

"We're in charge of running all the Portland Pride activities," Lisha continues, and for a second, before all of it hits him at once, he thinks that Portland must be really big on civic pride, to have their own parade. 

Javi looks at him pityingly and explains, "For the Portland LGBTQIA+ community?" 

"Oh," he says, blinking. Right. That Pride. That parade. "Well. What can I do for you?" 

"We're working on scheduling some events for this June," Javi explains. "And you have _such_ a nice space here." 

Lisha nods vigorously. Her nose ring bounces a little. "We were really hoping that The Fulcrum might be willing to be one of the official after-party host sites for this year's Pride Parade." 

"Oh," Eliot says. 

Truth be told, Eliot has never really understood the need for all the parades and the hoopla and what have you. Just seemed unnecessarily showy. But the more he talks to Hardison, and the more he's with Hardison, he's willing to believe that maybe, just like Kat's pronouns, he doesn't have to understand it to support it. But he doesn't say any of that to these folks. After all, Kat sent these two to talk to him-- not Hardison, not Parker, just him-- and he's not about to repay that gesture of goodwill by being rude as hell to their friends. Just because he doesn't feel the need to do the whole parade thing himself-- which he doesn't, because it's nobody's business who he is or loves or whatever-- doesn't mean other people can't, or that his bar can't make some money opening its doors to the community. 

"Uh, yeah," Eliot says, rubbing the back of his head. "Shouldn't be a problem, but I don't own this place by myself. I need to talk to my partners about it." 

"Of course," Javi says. 

"When you talk to them, please give us a call," Lisha says, smiling as she slides a business card across the bar. He nods and picks it up, running his thumb over the rainbow logo. 

"Will do," he says, and looks at them, really looks, takes in the tattoos-- those are bi flag colors on Lisha's arm, he recognizes now, and of course they are-- and all the little enamel pins that cover Javi's jacket, including one that says _be gay do crimes_. Well, he can relate to that, at least. Shit, these kids. They can't be that much older than he was when he left home-- _maybe_ they're twenty-two?-- and here they are, not only aware of who they are but comfortable enough-- brave enough-- to just be. Feels a little like someone's squeezing his heart. God, he's going soft. This whole thing is making him soft. Or maybe it's just kids. He's always a little soft for kids, even twenty-two year old kids who probably think they're grown. And he doesn't seem much like he's gonna stop being soft any time soon, because instead of telling them to have a good day and ushering them out the door so they can close up until dinner, he says, "Uh-- you folks had lunch?" 

"No, but we wouldn't want to be trouble," says Javi. He looks at his watch. "Isn't your kitchen closed until dinner service?" 

Eliot musters a smile and tucks Lisha's business card in his back pocket. "Well, I'm kind of the kitchen, so you're in luck. Have a seat, if you want." They smile back and settle onto some barstools, and he grabs a couple of menus and sets them down. "Drinks?" he asks. 

"Ooh. Can I try that Den of Thieves? I've heard _great_ things," asks Javi, sliding his ID across the bar. Eliot spares it a glance-- twenty-two, right on the money-- and nods before looking over at Lisha. "Anything for you?" 

"Oh, I don't drink," Lisha laughs. She winks and holds up her hands, wrists together. "I'm allergic to alcohol-- I break out in handcuffs." 

Eliot raises his eyebrows. "Got it. Well, I've been working on my mocktail game, if you're interested," he offers. "Not gonna charge you for it, since it's an experiment." 

The truth is that he's probably not gonna charge them for lunch, either, but they don't have to know that right now. 

"Mmm. We do love a mocktail," she drawls. "Sure." 

"Can do," he says. 

They order and he slips into the kitchen to make their food. When he brings it back, Kat is finishing up their side work at the bar and has poured Javi his beer, and the three of them are laughing. 

"Oh, wow," Lisha says, as Eliot sets their food down. "This looks amazing." 

"Everything here's good," Kat tells her. They smile conspiratorially at Eliot. "Especially the bibimbap burger." 

He grins. "Thanks again for the help with the kimchi." 

"I can't work someplace that serves substandard kimchi," they tell him. "My grandmother would know, and she would come down here personally. No one needs that." 

"I know better than to upset someone's grandma," Eliot says. "Speaking of food-- you got that list we went over narrowed down for me yet, by the way?" 

Kat rocks back and forth on their feet. "I've got it down to like, three things." 

"Okay," he says. "The menu's ready when you are." 

"Thanks," they say. 

Eliot looks over at Javi. "How's the beer?" 

"Exactly as good as advertised," Javi says. "Maybe better." 

"Glad to hear it," Eliot replies, and then sets to work pulling together a non-alcoholic drink for Lisha that he's been puzzling over for a couple of weeks now but hasn't really had a chance to test. He pushes it across the bar. 

"Be brutally honest about that," he says to Lisha, nodding at the glass. "Nothing goes on this menu that ain't good." 

"Will do," she says, and sips at it, tentatively at first, and then a much longer drink. "Oh my god," she says. "This is incredible." She sniffs it. "What is it?" 

"It's sort of a take on an old-fashioned," he tells her. "Cherry bark honey simple syrup, non-alcoholic bitters, and to make up for the missing whiskey there's some barley tea with some fresh rosemary steeped in it." 

"Damn, Eliot," Kat says, and he just shrugs. 

"Yeah, I can't believe I'm about to say this," Lisha says, staring into the glass, "but I have to pay you for this drink. It's too good to be free." 

"Nah. I've got an alternative revenue stream for this one," he says, laughing to himself. Lisha and Javi look a little confused, but they don't ask. "Means don't worry about it." 

"Hmm. Everything here has such a fun name," Javi says, pointing at his beer. "What are you calling that?" 

Eliot looks at the glass for a split second and smiles. "A Nate Ford Special," he says. 

"I think there's a story there," Lisha says, as she takes another drink.

"Just someone else I know who's also allergic to alcohol," he tells her, and taps the bar. "And that's about all the story you're getting out of me on that one." 

He leaves them to finish their meal and heads to the kitchen to clean up. Kat wanders back after a while to ask about getting their check, and he just waves it off and says to tell them not to worry about it. "It's on me," he says. 

"That's really sweet, but they're gonna try to pay you anyway," Kat says. "Just FYI." 

They do, in fact, try to pay him, but Eliot's been a thief for a good cause for too long not to know how to put money back where it came from, and the cash they try to leave on the counter ends up back in Javi's jacket pocket without either of them noticing at all. 

"That beer was so good, thank you so much," Javi says, for the fifteenth time, and for the fifteenth time, Eliot tells him no thanks are necessary. "Okay, well, we hope to hear from you soon!" He darts forward and gives Eliot a hug, shouts, "Bye!!", then makes for the door, while Eliot just stands there, blinking. 

Lisha shakes her head. "Sorry about that," she says. "One beer and he just-- well." 

"The trippel's pretty intense," Eliot tells her. "But I'll remember that for next time." 

She smiles. "Call me when you talk to your business partners!" she says, waving, and hurries out the door to catch up with her friend.

Business partners. Right. Eliot stands at the bar for a long time after they're gone, tapping her business card idly on the bartop and trying to imagine a world where he felt that comfortable with himself at twenty-two. Hell, he's not even that comfortable with himself _now_. Twenty-two feels like a century ago. Twenty-two year-old Eliot would not recognize the guy in the mirror today for a variety of reasons. Different hair. A lot of regrets. A more jaded but definitely more realistic view of the country he thought he was serving. The kid that he was would be pretty horrified by the man he is now in a lot of respects, he knows. But just maybe, once he got past the initial shock, he'd look at Eliot now, at Eliot and Hardison and Parker and the way they love each other, and be relieved beyond measure that there would come a day when he could finally lay down this goddamn burden that has brought him so much shame and so many sleepless nights, to know there was a future where instead of hauling all of this baggage around, he could settle in between two people who love him and who he loves right back and just _be_. Even in front of other people. Not to flaunt some kind of _degenerate lifestyle_ , like he heard so much growing up, but just to participate fully in the simple, human act of loving somebody. 

Huh. Maybe he was wrong, before. Maybe it isn't nobody's business. Maybe it's his. 

"You okay?" Kat asks, breaking into his thoughts. 

"Huh?" 

"You've been out here for a while." They look at their watch. "Were you planning to stand there until dinner service, or what?" 

"Maybe. What, a man can't just stand at his own bar and think now?" he grumbles, but there's no actual bad feeling behind it and Kat can tell, because they're just laughing, and after a minute he gives in and laughs a little, too. 

+  
**Wednesday, April 24th, 2013**

_**The Fulcrum-- Cocktail Special** _

**The Kids are Alright.** _Blackcurrant soda, lemon simple syrup, non-alcoholic rose petal bitters._

"People are really digging that new drink, by the way," Jordan tells him as they're closing up. "I rang up a lot of those tonight." 

"Glad to hear it," Eliot says. He's wiping down the bar. "Figured we could use a few more non-alcoholic drinks around here. Thought it sounded good."

"Mocktails are very trendy," Jordan says. "At least, they're trendy according to about half the members of my gay brunch club, but that might just be because we're getting too old to pound mimosas at eleven in the morning." 

Eliot peers over at him. "You have a gay brunch club?" 

"Sure. All gays love brunch," he jokes, or maybe he's not joking, who knows? He looks thoughtfully at Eliot. "You know-- if we did brunch service we could probably make a lot of money." 

"Oh," Eliot says, because for a second he thought Jordan was going to invite him to gay brunch, and even though his heart was pounding pretty hard about it he was thinking about just ripping this bandaid off and saying yes, provided that this invitation included Hardison and Parker. Instead, he nods and tries to think about pub-worthy brunch food. "Uh, yeah, we could look at that. I'll talk to Hardison." 

"If you need to sell him on it just make up a menu item or two," Jordan advises. "That man loves your food. I swear, literally every time I see him he brings it up. Eliot made this, Eliot made that. Are you that man's personal chef?"

Eliot clears his throat. "Something like that," he says, and just lets his voice let the words sound a little more meaningful, a little more like what he actually means. 

He looks at Jordan. Jordan looks at him. His heartbeat is like rolling thunder in his ears. 

"Should I be inviting you to brunch?" Jordan asks, after a minute. 

"Maybe," Eliot says. He scrubs at a spot on the counter that he probably already cleaned. "Might need a couple of extra seats, though." 

Jordan just smiles. "I think that can be arranged."


	7. three's company.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The new team arrives in Portland.

A couple of days before the new team members are due to arrive in Portland, Parker makes them sit through a dry run of her pitch to the new people, and a breakdown of the job she wants to run. Eliot and Hardison both think it's great, and they tell her so, but nothing they say seems to be the right thing to convince her. She spends a lot of the afternoon on the roof alone, and that night when they all climb into bed Parker puts herself in the middle, which isn't always an indication that she's upset, but it definitely seems that way tonight. She pushes her forehead against Hardison's chest and reaches her hand back for Eliot, who slides close and slips his arms around her from behind. Hardison puts his hand over Eliot's where it rests on Parker's hip, and they all just stay there quietly for a while. 

He and Hardison look at each other over the top of Parker's head and have a silent conversation about what to do, which involves a lot of eyebrows and mouthed expressions of "I don't know, _you_ say something," and ultimately they just keep still where they are until she feels like talking. 

"What if they don't show up?" she asks finally, picking at Hardison's t-shirt. "What if it wasn't enough of a hook?" 

"They'll show up," Eliot says. "We picked the right people. And they were definitely interested." 

"I know for sure my man Nish will be here," Hardison says. "He was way too excited to meet yours truly to not show up for this." 

"You played it right," Eliot tells her. "They'll be here." 

"Okay, but did I pick the right job? Should we have gone with something different? What if it's not enough and it really is just one job and we have to start all of this over?" 

Eliot kisses her shoulder. "You've been planning this for months," he says. "You're ready." 

"We trust you," Hardison tells her. "And this isn't your first job, Parker, you've run stuff since they left." 

"I run things for _us_ ," she says, gesturing at all of them. "The three of us. I know you. You know me. It's different." 

Eliot and Hardison exchange another look. Eliot shrugs. 

"Do you just want to be upset right now? Because that's valid, and we support you," Hardison tells her, running his fingers gently over her cheek.

They can hear her thinking about it. She looks up at Hardison. Looks back over her shoulder at Eliot. "What are my other options?" she asks. 

"I mean, we could always just distract you for a while instead," Eliot says. "We're pretty good at that." 

"Yes we are," Hardison agrees. 

"That does sound better," Parker tells them, and it is. 

+

They close the restaurant for the day, just so the new crew can come in without inviting too many questions from the Fulcrum's staff, who all have a paid night off plus maybe a little extra to make up for lost tips. Hardison tries to argue about that, but Eliot puts his foot down. Firmly. 

"We're not gonna treat people like that," he says. "The service industry's hard enough as it is, and it's not like we don't have the damn money." 

"I should have known," Hardison sighs. "We hired too many sad kids, didn't we? I know how you are. We're never gonna make any money on this place." 

"Our whole thing is helping people," Eliot grumbles. "We're supposed to be the good guys. Good guys don't stiff their staff."

"Yeah, yeah, I got you," Hardison says. 

That afternoon, right on time, the new team shows up on time and with plenty of questions about what this is and how it works. Parker runs them through it, and Eliot and Hardison let the new people take the chairs so they can stand in the back and occasionally look at each other in the moments when they're so both just damn proud of her that they don't know what else to do. She's been good at this, but having new people here has really pushed her to grow even more-- there was never anything wrong with the way she ran things, it was just still a lot Nate and not a lot of Parker, but that made sense. He taught them, taught her, and the first few things they've done it probably would have felt weird to do anything else. But none of these folks went to the Nate Ford School of Sort of Reforming Criminals to Use Their Powers for Good, so it's easier for her to put a little more of her own spin on it, and it's good to see. 

"Let me see if I got this," Jess says, drumming her nails on the tabletop after Parker explains what they do and why they called each of the new kids here. "You want us to steal things, but only from bad people? And they go down, and we help people, but we still get paid?" 

"Got it in one," Hardison says. 

"And you've done this a lot," Jess continues. "And you haven't gotten arrested." 

"Not us," Eliot says, which is true, because that was just Nate, the one time, and he still thinks he could have taken those guys. That doesn't count for the rest of them. 

Dani looks around. "Just the three of you? The three of you built all of this." 

"A couple of our original members just retired," Hardison says. "And let's just say, our last job left us with a whole bunch of work and an opening or two."

Nish and Ryan look at each other, and Dani and Jess trade a look. 

"Retired. And that isn't code for pinched?" Nish asks. "Seriously?" 

"Or worse?" asks Dani. 

"They fell in love and went off to get married, okay?" Eliot says, because they might as well be honest, and all four of them turn and stare at him. "What? That's what happened, I was here, the guy got down on one knee and everything." 

"Oh my god," Jess says, one hand over her heart. "They fell in love doing crime together? That's actually kind of romantic." 

"Only if he stole the ring," Dani says, and the rest of them nod. 

"Oh, well, stipulated," Nish says. "Who buys things anymore?" 

"Not me, that's for damn sure," Ryan says.

"Yep. Definitely," Parker lies. "He definitely stole the ring." 

"Aw," Jess says. "Cute. For a guy, I guess."

Dani gives her a curious look. 

"I said what I said," Jess says, looking right back, and Dani grins. 

"Okay. This might be fun for one job," Dani says. 

"Yeah, I mean, I usually work alone," Ryan says, looking around. "Or maybe with the occasional forger. But y'all seem okay, and this place wasn't cheap, so you clearly made some money somewhere. Sounds fun. I'm in." 

"I'll be honest, I am extremely jealous of this setup," Nish says, pointing at the screens. "I would work with you for that alone." 

"It is nice," Jess says. "Those beams look really good for climbing." 

"I have a tournament to train for, though, so this is just one job," Dani says, holding up a finger. 

"Definitely," Nish agrees. 

"Oh, yeah," Ryan says. "This ain't my long-term retirement plan, you understand." 

"Yeah, I work alone, but I can do this," Jess says finally, nodding. "One job." 

"Sure," Hardison says, smiling at Eliot and Parker. "One job." 

"So," Nish asks, rubbing his hands together. "What are we stealing?" 

Hardison steps up to help run the display, so Eliot settles into the empty chair at the end of the table as Parker takes them through their target, a hedge fund headquartered in Dublin that made fifteen billion dollars in the market crash investing in distressed debt. He watches all four of them listening as Parker describes the mark and the money, watches her reel them all in with this story, just as good as any grifter. She was the right person to do this, and yeah, they picked the right people for this new team. He knew that already, but it is so obvious, sitting here. The way Dani and Jess are already leaning towards each other in a way that is wholly unnecessary, the way Ryan's making fun of Nish for all his techno stuff but in a way that is very familial. 

Eliot's glad Parker's gone over this job with them so many times already, because at a certain point he's just sitting here lost in memories from a few years ago, wondering if Nate knew this early on what they had, watching all of them sitting around that table on that first official job in the first office. He must have done. You probably couldn't miss it, the way Hardison kept trying to impress Parker, the way him and Hardison were sitting so close sometimes that if you looked at them from the wrong angle they probably looked like they were holding hands. He glances over to find Hardison looking at him, smiling, probably thinking about the same damn thing. He smiles back. 

"Sorry," Dani interrupts, "these people _made_ money during a market crash? And not just some money but like, billions of dollars? Did I hear that right? How the hell is that even possible?" 

"No idea. I've stolen plenty from 'em, but I've never really understood hedge fund people," Ryan shrugs. 

"Don't look here either," says Jess. "I've stolen a few things from hedge fund managers, too, but they could all be described in karats, not any of the weird word salad Parker just said." 

"They're basically just like us," Nish says. "They're thieves. What they do is theft, it's just legal, and at such a large scale that most people can't even comprehend it. Fifteen billion dollars is just a sliver of the total number of assets these people are probably playing with. There was something to the effect of over three hundred billion at issue in underperforming asset write-downs during the market crash. That's an enormous sum. No one thinks of money that way." 

"I can think of a lot of things to do with that much money," Jess says. "A lot of things." 

"Sure, we all can," Nish says. "But we're thieves. The average person is too busy being ground to dust in the capitalist machine to look up and realize that a relatively small number of people have just decided that ninety-nine percent of the world's made-up wealth is theirs." 

"Listen, I don't disagree with anything you just said," Ryan says, "but you sound like a full time Twitter, my dude." 

"I am extremely online," he sniffs. 

"Nerd," coughs Dani. 

"Yes, and we're very en vogue, thank you," Nish says. "Enjoying that iPhone? Thank a nerd." 

Dani just rolls her eyes.

"Age of the geek, I keep telling y'all," Hardison says, and Nish points at him. 

"He gets it," Nish says.

"Can we get back to stealing from people who have fifteen billion dollars?" Dani asks. "Because that part of this makes sense to me." 

"Hear, hear," says Ryan.

"To answer your first question," Parker says, "yes, they made money during the crash. Here's how we're going to take some of it from them." 

And they're off. Parker runs them through the plan, which involves two cities, a whole hell of a lot of money, and a music company. 

"All right. We leave tomorrow morning," Parker says. "Any questions?" As everyone shakes their heads, Parker grins. "Good. Let's go steal a symphony." 

+

The new crew ends up sticking around for dinner, and with the restaurant closed everybody gathers around a couple of tables in the middle of the floor while Eliot passes food around. It's nothing fancy, just a late spring panzanella and some pasta tossed with caramelized onions, greens, yogurt, and goat cheese, but if he does say so himself it's pretty delicious in its simplicity. Everybody seems satisfied, anyway, if the empty dishes and happy faces are anything to go by.

Hardison passes around a couple pitchers of beer, the session ale that Hardison named _Lucille_ , and somewhere between the first and last glass Eliot realizes that it's good that he's been working on this wider worldview of his, because the new team seems to be queer as a three dollar bill. 

"This place is great," Dani says. Her arm is very casually slung across the back of the chair next to her, which just happens to be the chair Jess is sitting in, and Eliot does admire her game. "But does anyone want to get outta here for a while?" 

"I'd be into that," Jess says. She looks over at Nish and waves at his phone. "Do your internet thing. Find us a bar or something." She glances sideways at Dani and smiles. "Queer friendly, if possible."

"It's Portland," Dani says. "That should be more than possible." 

Nish stares at both of them. "My _internet thing_? I'm sorry, did you mean, _Google_? What I do is so sophisticated and elegant and you're comparing it to a Google--" 

"Shut up and search," Dani says, hitting him on the arm. "Ryan, you in?" 

"I took _be gay, do crimes,_ pretty literally on both counts," drawls Ryan, "so, yeah. Sign me up." 

"Do I demean you by calling you a common pickpocket?" Nish demands of Jess, who is now laughing so hard she falls against Dani. "No, I don't, I respect your craft, don't I!" 

"Look," Jess wheezes, "if you can't find one for us, man, just say so." 

"We can always just Google it," Dani snickers, and pulls out her phone. 

"I cannot believe the level of disrespect," Nish mutters, and waves his phone at them, the screen displaying a map of Portland with little rainbow pins and logos next to each one. "There. Can bloody Google do that for you?" 

"I mean, yeah," Ryan says, and Dani falls against Jess, cackling, while Nish sputters, wide-eyed, in the background. "Theirs don't have, like, rainbows or whatever, but they got _maps_. I'm a little concerned now that you don't know what Google is, Nish." 

"Angels and ministers of grace preserve me," he mumbles, pinching the bridge of his nose. "This is a customized webcrawler that I have sent out while you have been sitting here mocking me, with no prior preparation whatsoever, mind you, to compile and prioritize a list of queer-owned and queer-friendly establishments in the greater Portland area, filtered by reviews, social media profiles, news articles, price and proximity," he says, gesturing wildly at the phone screen. "There's even a bear filter! Look! Can Google do this? No! _I am your Google now!_ " 

"Wow," Dani says. "Calm down, Gupta." 

At the other end of the table, Hardison leans over to Eliot and Parker and murmurs quietly, "Do I sound like that?" 

"Sometimes," Parker says. Eliot shrugs and nods in agreement. 

"Damn," Hardison says. 

The new crew keeps bickering for a while, debating the various pros and cons of the different establishments on Nish's map. Parker slips away after a bit to go do some more work upstairs, and Eliot stays with Hardison and tries to pretend that he's very interested in something on his phone, but what he's actually doing is listening, because he doesn't know what half this shit means, and maybe he should at least have some kind of passing understanding. Preferably before they go to gay brunch. 

"Hey, Hardison," Dani says. "Gay bars. You got any recommendations?" 

"I haven't been, but I hear good things about Le Bar en Rose," Hardison tells them.

"What about you," Ryan asks, looking at Eliot. Jess pokes them on the arm. "What? Seemed rude not to ask." 

"Uh," Eliot says. He has nothing to contribute to this at all, but he feels like he should, so he just says, "What Hardison said." 

"Right," Jess says. She shares a look with Dani, and they go back to their discussion, eventually deciding to just go with what Hardison suggested, which seems to really annoy Nish and his algorithm.

"I do all this work, and we just ask someone," Nish mutters, as they're all gathering up their jackets and things. 

Eliot and Hardison share a look and a chuckle. 

"If you want to join us, you're welcome," Jess says to Hardison. "Especially since it was your suggestion and not this human computer's." Nish looks heavenward and shakes his head. 

"Thanks, but I'm good here," Hardison says, smiling at all of them. "Got a lot to set up before we leave tomorrow. Next time for sure, though." 

"Maybe next time you can explain to them what it is that we do," Nish sighs. "The sophisticated, elegant thing that we do." 

Ryan claps him on the back. "There's just no techno-substitute for the queer whisper network," they tell him. "But we know you tried your best." 

"Yeah, come on, Google," Jess laughs. "Maybe we'll buy your first round." 

"Doesn't really seem like your scene," Dani says to Eliot, as she's on her way out. She shoves her hands into the pockets of her cropped leather jacket. "But uh. I guess you can come with, if you want." 

The others shift from side to side in the doorway, waiting, maybe a little uncomfortable. 

"Uh, thanks," he says. "But I think I'm in for the night, though." 

"Try not to be too hungover tomorrow morning," Hardison calls after them. 

"What are you, mother hen?" Eliot asks. 

Hardison shrugs. "Sophie used to fuss over us sometimes. Someone has to do it," he says. "It's not going to be you. It is definitely not going to be Parker." 

"Fair enough," Eliot tells him. 

"Speaking of fussing over people," Hardison says, "You okay? They could have been a little nicer about that invite." 

"I don't need people to be nice to me, Hardison," Eliot says. 

"They're just testing your limits," Hardison says. 

"They're all like, what, twenty-one years old? Maybe a little older?" Eliot says, shrugging. "They're kids. They do that. Don't know why I'm the only one they did it to, but they don't have to like me to be good thieves." 

"It's not that," Hardison says. "They think you're straight. Like, with a capital S. They're feeling you out to see if you're gonna be shitty about them not being straight." 

Eliot frowns. "Is that a thing people do?" 

"That is very much a thing people do," Hardison says. "Maybe you and Dani and your punchy hands aren't as worried as the rest of us about a little garden variety homophobia but Jess and Nish and Ryan? They don't have that luxury." 

"But I'm-- you know," he says, waving his hand between himself and Hardison. "I live here." 

"I know," Hardison says. 

"I'm _with_ you," he says. 

"I know," Hardison says, again. 

"I know I could make that a little more obvious sometimes, and I know you don't think I'm working on it, but I am," Eliot says. 

"I know you're working on it," Hardison says. "You got us an invite to gay brunch, baby, you are clearly working on it." 

"Yeah," Eliot says, and he is sort of pleased with himself about it. "I did do that." 

"You did, and I'm proud of you," Hardison says. "That's no small thing. And maybe it's not always easy for me being the touchiest person in this relationship, but look, Parker hugs people now. There's hope for you." 

"Maybe so," he says. "That reminds me. Some people came in earlier this week asking if we'd be interested in hosting an afterparty for the uh, Pride parade." 

"Oh yeah? You told them yes, right?" 

"I told them I needed to talk to my partners about it," he says. "Here I am, talking to you. I'll run it by Parker, too, I just--" 

"What's to talk about?" Hardison interrupts. "It's good business, if nothing else. We're gonna make so much money serving all those drinks. I mean, so much restaurant money. We'll make more money on this job than we'll make in ten years with this restaurant." 

"It's not just about the money, it's about protecting us," Eliot points out. "It's my job to keep us safe. I'm fine to do whatever we need to do for the restaurant to stay afloat, but if we get too big and too noticeable we're going to call attention to ourselves, and not all of it will be the good kind." 

"I know that, but-- look, I may never plan to retire, and Parker may never plan to retire, but...I don't think you feel that way," Hardison says. "Do you?" 

"Retirement for me used to mean a cemetery," he shrugs. 

"Don't say shit like that," Hardison sighs. "I know it's true. You don't have to say it." 

Eliot holds his hand out, and Hardison takes it. "Okay," he says, and looks around the restaurant. "To answer your question, yeah: the few times I had occasion to think about it, sure, I thought about retiring. Even thought about opening my own place." 

"Do you think I didn't know that?" Hardison says. "I know you are aware, because I told you, that this whole thing was basically just boyfriend bait, and don't tell me I didn't need to do it, either, because I know, and you know, that you were probably never gonna do it on your own." 

"I might have," he growls, but deep down he knows Hardison's right. He hadn't been wrong when he told Sophie he'd adjust the best to normal, that he'd thought about having a place of his own, but he also hadn't actually sat down and planned for any kind of eventual normal beyond just talking about it a couple of times. If this crew hadn't come along, if Hardison and Parker hadn't made space for him here, he doesn't know where he would be today, but it definitely wouldn't be behind the bar of his own restaurant, making art and learning to be himself and helping other queer people with their food-related dreams. 

"This place is ours, collectively, but mostly, Eliot, it was for you," Hardison says. "I can keep hacking until I'm old and grey and beyond, but your thing has a shorter shelf life."

"Don't count me out just yet, here," Eliot grumbles. "Did I seem old to you last night? Or this morning?" 

"No," Hardison smiles, "no you did not. But that isn't what I'm saying, and you know it." 

"Yeah, I know," he says.

"This place is an investment in our future," Hardison continues. "I know we need to be careful, but I also want us to make decisions about it that keep it successful, so it's still here for you later."

"Okay, but later's a long time away," Eliot says. A long, long time, if he has anything to say about it. He loves this place but not nearly as much as he loves these people, and he can't imagine finding anyone he trusts to keep them safe more than he trusts the strength of his own two hands. And sure, there are other fighters, there are other people who can take a hit and keep going. But there is no one else who loves them like he does, so there is no one else who will fight as hard, and he doesn't want to think about this anymore, so he pulls on Hardison's hand to bring him close enough that he can lean over and kiss him, hard, with every ounce of the same ferocity he puts into protecting him and Parker. 

"You know," Hardison says, when they pull back because they both need some air, "that protective thing you do is pretty hot." 

"I know," Eliot smirks. 

"Mmhmm. And I am looking forward to exploring that a little more now that we're doing jobs again," Hardison tells him, "but before we get too distracted-- Eliot, man, we trust you with our lives. Literally. So if you don't think doing this afterparty is a good idea, I can respect that, and Parker will, too." 

"Yeah," Eliot frowns. 

"Unless," Hardison says, laying his hand on Eliot's arm, "protecting us wasn't entirely what your hesitation was about." He gives Eliot a very knowing look, and it isn't that Eliot regrets that his boyfriend's a genius, exactly, but sometimes it's a little annoying that he always seems to know what's going on with Eliot's feelings even before he does. 

"Fine. I don't get it," Eliot admits. "I don't get the-- parades, and stuff, I don't get it. And I feel like I should, and I don't, and I don't know what to do with all that. Those kids who came in to talk to me about it-- they know who they are. Nobody's gonna have any questions, when they show up to the party, that they belong there. They _want_ to belong there. And I'm just-- I don't even know how to explain it." 

"Do you want to belong there?" Hardison asks. "Honest question. No wrong answer." 

"I don't know," he sighs. "But I don't want people to think I'm there to be a jerk to them. There's plenty of times and places where I'm fine with people knowing I'm a threat. I work hard at it. But I do that to keep you safe, to keep Parker safe. I don't-- I'm not gonna-- I'm just not wild about the idea that we're gonna have a bunch of people in here, like tonight, who I guess should get me but instead they're just gonna think, I don't know, that I'm not-- who I am. I know you said I don't need a haircut and tattoo to fit in, but sometimes," he waves his hand at the empty seats where the new crew had been, "it feels that way." 

"Do you see me with a queer haircut and a tattoo?" Hardison asks. "I never said that they weren't testing me a little, too, asking me for gay bar recommendations. They're just trying to keep themselves safe, just like you did, for a really long time. But I swear to you, there's no one right way to be who you are." 

"Yeah," Eliot sighs. "I think maybe there's a lot of wrong ways, though." 

Hardison rubs his shoulder. "I get why you think that, but I promise you, you're doing fine." 

"Yeah, maybe." 

"I will say to you what I said to Parker the other night: if you just want to be upset for a while, that's valid, and I support you," Hardison says, and when Eliot shakes his head, he smiles, nice and slow. "I am also available for distractions." 

"I don't mind being distracted," he tells Hardison, "but first I've gotta clean up this mess." 

Hardison looks from the empty dishes to Eliot and back. "Like, metaphorically, or-- "

"Shut up and help me do the damn dishes so we can go have sex," Eliot interrupts, and Hardison just grins and grabs some empty plates. 

He will figure the metaphorical mess out later. Tonight, he has other plans. 

+

**Monday, April 29th, 2013**

_**The Fulcrum-- Dessert Special** _

_**Three's Company** Three miniature layers of marble cake separated by layers of fruit and topped with Chantilly cream._

"This is what I'm leaving for a dessert special while we're in Dublin," Eliot says. He frowns at the plates in his hands and looks at Hardison and Parker, who are curled up in bed. "This is messy. I don't know if we should eat this in here." 

"We've done plenty of messy things in here," Parker points out. She looks very smug about it. She probably should. 

"That is an entirely different kind of messy, sweetheart," Eliot says, grinning. He looks at the two of them and shakes his head. "Oh well. I guess if you end up with cream all over you, we'll find a way to get it off." 

"Mmhmm," says Hardison, and holds his hand out for the plates, which Eliot carefully hands over before sitting back down to watch them eat. 

"Where's yours?" Parker asks, as she and Hardison dig in. 

"I tasted it as I went," Eliot shrugs. "I know I like it. I wanted to see what you think." 

"I think _yes_ ," Parker moans, around a mouthful of fruit covered in cream. "So good." 

"Hmm," Eliot says, because this isn't sounding all that different from what they were doing before there was cake. 

"Mmph. What are you calling this?" Hardison asks. "So I know to ask you to make it again." 

"Three's company, I think," Eliot says. 

"Three's company? And when exactly did you come up with the idea for this?" asks Hardison, holding a forkful of cake in front of his mouth. 

"Inspiration can come from anywhere," Eliot smirks. 

"I get it," Parker says, nodding.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to my wife, [leiascully](https://archiveofourown.org/users/leiascully), for naming the gay bar mentioned in this chapter! 
> 
> Also, in case you wanted to be real mad at something: the hedge fund mentioned here is based on real one, and yes, they really did make a bunch of money during the market crash. Capitalism is a plague, etc.


	8. pride & joy.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A job done well is its own reward, but the money and getting to the end of this whole emotional whatever ain't bad, either.

Parker's frankly elegant fucking plan to infiltrate this hedge fund actually starts outside of Boston, not Dublin. The new team heads there first, to the headquarters of a music business that the fund's in the process of acquiring. Boston's still not the safest place for them to be, but what needs doing can be done without the three of them, and, as Parker points out to them on the plane over to Dublin, this gives Ryan, Nish, Jess, and Dani a chance to see how they work with each other. 

"I hope they're doing all right," Hardison says. "I mean, I know they can handle it, I just hope everything goes to plan, you know?" 

"It won't," Parker says. Now that they're in the middle of the con, her nerves are gone, and she just sounds like Parker again. Confident. Ready. Maybe a little cold and calculating, but like, in a good way. "That's okay. That's part of the plan." 

"You gave them a problem to solve so they'd bond over it, didn't you," Eliot says, and she nods. 

"Sometimes that brain is a little scary," Hardison tells her. "But like, sexy scary." 

"Thanks," she grins. 

When they do join Eliot, Parker, and Hardison in Dublin, the new team brings a lot of stories, some inside jokes, and a report of job eventually well done, so it seems like Parker's plan was pretty solid. 

The rest of the con is smooth like molasses and Eliot, grateful as part of him will always be to Nate Ford for bringing these people into his life, wonders how in the hell they ever managed to do anything without someone stone cold sober calling the shots. 

After it's done and they have sufficiently gloated in front of their marks, they lose themselves among the crowds of tourists pressed into the old streets of Temple Bar, meandering to a few different bars over the course of a couple of hours. They wind up in what is most definitely a gay bar, which freaks him out way less than it would have a year ago. It's honestly pretty okay. Here's to growth, he thinks to himself, and takes a very long sip of Guinness. 

He notices a couple of guys checking Hardison out, which, yeah, they should, because he's wearing one of those weird zipper jacket things that leave nothing about his arms or shoulders to the imagination, and wow, okay, hey, jealousy, that's new. Eliot has not previously been a person who really experiences jealousy; he has what he wants and what he needs and there's no reason to covet anything his neighbor's got. But still, watching these guys watch Hardison doesn't feel great, even if Hardison is sandwiched here between him and Parker and doesn't seem to be paying attention.

Maybe he should lean over and kiss Hardison in front of God and everybody. Maybe then this whole mess would be sorted out, and the crew would know, and the world would know, and that would be that. If there's a way to actually get your diploma from gay school at least one of the ways has got to be kissing your boyfriend in front of a bunch of strangers and new queer acquaintances in the middle of an Irish gay bar. But he doesn't do it. He can't do it like that. If and when he can get over his lifetime of issues and be openly, physically affectionate with this person that he loves, it will be because he just loves him and he wants to, not because he feels weird and possessive. He's not putting that on Hardison, who would definitely know what he was doing and why and who would probably kiss him back in the moment, but he can see how everything plays out after that and it doesn't end well. 

So instead, he just volunteers to wade through the crowd and get some more drinks for people in the crew who need refills. It's a good distraction. This place is packed, and he has to get up close and a little personal with more than a few folks trying to squeeze his way up to the bar to order another round. Most just try to let him through without much trouble, but a few of them look at him like they wouldn't mind taking him home, and a few of them look at him like maybe he shouldn't be here at all, and dammit, maybe he should have just kissed Hardison anyway. 

He wonders, while he waits for the bartender, how he would play it if he were on a con. How to blend in, not be noticed unless you want to be. The answer is probably that he just wouldn't, would probably just pretend to be some drunk straight guy who stumbled in here not knowing any better instead of pretending he should be here, because pretending to be something you are but don't want to be is harder than pretending to be someone you aren't. He knows that much from the time they pulled that first job where they had to visit Nate in rehab, and Hardison pretended to be his boyfriend, leaning into this fake stereotypical accent that was just to sell the con but that was also his only understanding of queerness at the time, and it felt like his heart and lungs fused together in his chest when Hardison tugged on his arm. He doesn't feel that way anymore. He knows better. Knows himself a hell of a lot better. Definitely knows Hardison better. But he still doesn't really know how to fit in. Maybe that was part of what he lost, hiding this part of himself for so long. Maybe you don't get it back. 

But the bartender comes back with what he ordered and there's no more time for reflection. Eliot grabs their drinks and turns around. There are possibly more people here than there were before, and now he has two hands full of drinks, and he's nimble enough when he needs to be but this situation is really more geared toward Parker and her laser grid acrobatics. He looks pityingly at the drinks in his hands, knowing some of them will probably be lost on the way, and presses back into the crowd. 

He does okay, right up until he's maybe two small clusters of people away from their table, and then despite his best efforts a couple of people turn around at the wrong minute, and somebody else falls into his back, and he stays on his feet but not without sloshing half a beer on this tall thin white guy with white blonde hair and some ripped up jacket that's half denim and half leather, with a big patch on the front that says, in blocky text that was clearly hand-lettered, _queer as in **fuck** you_. 

"Shit," Eliot says. "Sorry, man." 

"Fuckin' Americans," the guy says. He narrows his eyes at Eliot. "Are you lost? This is a fucking gay bar." 

"I am definitely not lost," he mutters. 

"What was that?" 

He takes a breath. It's not like he can't take pretty much everybody in here, this guy included, but they're supposed to be keeping a low profile, and getting into a scuffle over a spilled beer ain't it. "I'm--" 

"Gentlemen," Ryan's voice cuts in. Their Alabama drawl has been replaced with a strong Irish accent, and for a second Eliot just enjoys watching a good grifter at work. "He's all right, he didn't mean nothin' by it. He's with me." 

"Oh," says the jacket guy, looking incredulously from Ryan to Eliot and back. "Really?" 

Ryan nods. "It's not his fault, his face just does that," they continue. Eliot frowns at them for good measure. "See? But it does make him a damn good bodyguard." 

The guy looks him up and down. "Well how do you like that," he says. "Straight people have their uses after all." 

Ryan smiles, and it seems to Eliot that there's a hint more teeth in it than usual, but he's probably imagining it. "Hey now, he's family," Ryan says, and Eliot's heart pounds a little harder in his chest at the implication until Ryan continues, "He's my cousin." 

"Apologies to your cousin, then," the guy says. "But tell him to keep a better eye on his beer from now on." 

"Will do," Ryan assures him. "Have a good night." 

"Uh, thanks," Eliot says, as they slip through the rest of the crowd back to their table. 

"No problem at all," Ryan tells him, their accent back to its usual round Alabaman vowels. "We gotta stick together, right? And who the hell knows, you might even be my cousin."

"Might be," he shrugs. "If you want to crash the next family reunion, just let me know." 

Ryan laughs so hard that it's more like a cackle. "Tell you what, I might take you up on that just for the gag. Lord. If I turned up out of the blue with a man who looks like you? Cousin or not, my mama would be so happy you'd think she'd died and gone to heaven. She might even put me back in the will." 

They say it jokingly, and who knows, maybe at this point it is funny to them, but he has a feeling there's a lot of sad bullshit underneath it anyway. And there's probably no one universal queer experience, he knows that without anyone needing to guide him to it, knows it like he knows the difference between a South Alabama drawl and South Central Oklahoma twang. But even so the Bible Belt is sort of a unifying theme running through all of the south and the heartland, and he wonders, now, how Ryan deals with all of it, how they reconcile who they are and where they came from. Doesn't seem right to ask, doesn't seem like his place or his business, so he won't, but he's curious. 

"More drinks," they announce, as they get back to the table, and Eliot passes around what wasn't spilled. 

"Sorry about that, man," he says to Nish, when they figure out it was his beer that bit the dust. "It's tight quarters in here."

"Yeah? I bet I can get through this crowd without spilling anything," Jess says, eying a path to the bar. 

"You need another pair of hands?" Dani asks, smooth as anything, as Jess stands up. Eliot smirks a little. 

"Sure," Jess tells her, and together they slip through the crowd.

"Are y'all running a crew or match.com?" Ryan asks, watching them go. "'Cause that's gonna be a thing." 

"I do respect the game," Hardison says. He looks over at Eliot. "Is that like, a very important part of hitter training? How to hit people and hit _on_ people?" 

"We're just very _physical_ people," Eliot says, wiggling his eyebrows at Hardison. "If you know what I mean." 

"Oh, I was clear on that," Hardison says. 

"Very clear," Parker adds. 

Eliot just smiles and drinks his beer. 

Jess and Dani reappear about ten minutes later with more drinks and the conversation shifts around to let them back in. There's some talk about the job, and talk about other jobs they've pulled, and a lot of good-natured teasing of pretty much everybody, and he knows how this goes. They'll stick around. He smiles. Maybe it's the beer and all the laughter, or the warmth radiating from Hardison on one side of him and Parker on the other, or the well-earned satisfaction of a good job done right, but this, here, now, is home in a way that he honestly never really expected to have again. 

It's home, but not. Home, but more. More of who he is and less of who he pretended to be. 

At this point he's lived more of his life away from home than he ever spent there, and maybe sometimes lately he feels like those eighteen years did him more harm than good, but it wasn't all bad, not by a long shot. It's still a potluck, maybe, and not all of it was shitty corn casserole. Sometimes, when you're lucky, it's homemade lemon icebox pie. And it is unfuckingdeniable, as he sits here between Hardison and Parker, that he has been very, very lucky, lately. 

Maybe reconciling who he was, who he is, and who he's always been is just more of the same shit he had to do to be okay with this in the first place: keeping what works, tossing what doesn't. There's been plenty to throw away, but yeah, there are still things from home he can keep. The things that made him who he is, all of it formed in the crucible of blistering hot Oklahoma summers, late spring tornado seasons, rodeos and Friday night ball games and Sunday afternoon potlucks, wide lakes and old muddy rivers and a sky above it all so big and full of stars that looking at it made you feel like you were part of forever. It made him a person who is tough but who can still be soft sometimes, a person who can keep an eye out for trouble and know when it comes that he can weather the storm. More than anything maybe it gave him a bone-deep desire to protect other people when they need protecting, especially his own people. 

And who he claims as _his own_ is shifting, has been since he sat on a roof years ago with this weird hacker and weirder thief and had no idea how much his life had already changed. That little circle of people widens more and more every day. Now it's Kat and their eighteen piercings and ever-changing hair and pronouns that Eliot doesn't entirely get but at least understands are important. It's Brady and the people at Thorns games waving rainbow flags. It's Jordan and Cal and their complicated former military feelings and their brunch club. It's Ryan and Jess and Dani and Nish, all of them, just out here being who they are and being damn good thieves, too, and God, some people sure do work their way into your heart quick, don't they. 

Before he can talk himself out of it, he taps Hardison on the arm, motioning for him to let him up so he can slide out of the bar, doing the mental math on the way to make sure that it's a reasonable hour back home in Portland. As soon as he's outside, he pulls out his phone and the business card for the Portland Pride organizers, takes a deep breath, and dials.

"Hey, this is Eliot Spencer," he says, when Lisha picks up. "With The Fulcrum? I just wanted to call and let you know that uh, we're in." 

"Fantastic!" she says. "I'm so glad. We really appreciate you and your business partners." 

He takes a breath and closes his eyes and thinks about community and casseroles and a bunch of other stuff that wouldn't make sense to anybody except maybe Ryan, and says, "Uh, yeah. About that. I-- never exactly said they were just my business partners," he says, and hopes like hell she will not need further explanation.

"Oh my god," Lisha says. "I'm _so_ sorry, I didn't mean to--"

"Don't worry about it," he interrupts. "I should have said something the other day, uh, you know, sometimes there just doesn't seem to be a moment--" 

"No, no, I totally get it," she says. "Oh wow, thank you for saying something, seriously, this is so exciting! The community's going to be thrilled to have another queer-owned venue here."

He freezes. His mouth hangs open a little. He blinks a lot. Thinks about Hardison, and Parker, thinks about himself, mentally connecting the dots between their relationship and their business in a way he never has before. Jesus. He should have let Hardison handle this, Hardison and his chill Nana who made sure he didn't grow up thinking that he was going to hell for who he was, Hardison who has always known he isn't a mistake and consequently didn't spend a lot of his life doing bad things for bad people out of some assumption that he was already damned anyway, so why the hell not. Hardison, who is a braver man than he will ever be, who understands the parades and how he fits into this community, and who wouldn't be standing here with his mouth hanging open like a fish out of water because someone referred to their restaurant, which is owned by people who are definitely not straight, as _queer owned_. He is maybe still wildly unprepared for all of this. God, surely it gets easier. 

Lisha's voice cuts through the static in his head. "Eliot? Did I lose you?" 

"Sorry," he says, and clears his throat. "Think I walked into a weird spot, can you hear me now?" 

"Yeah! Listen, I hate to ask since I know your bar's still pretty new, but we are literally always looking for new sponsors, it's so expensive to run this event, and I don't know if you'd be interested but I can send you some info, if you'd be willing to even consider it?" 

"Uh, yeah," he says. "I'll text you my email. We'll take a look." 

"Thank you _so much_ ," Lisha says. "I can come by the bar some time to go over everything with you, if that's okay?"

"Yeah," he tells her. "Uh. Wednesdays are usually pretty good." 

"Great," Lisha says. "I'll drop by Wednesday afternoon." 

"Yeah. See you then," he says. 

"Oh, and, if they're available, your partners are welcome to join us," she offers, and the way she says _partners_ now should sound exactly the same: it's the same word, same as before, but it isn't. It's warmer, somehow. Maybe because this time the feeling behind it is the god's honest truth, and okay, that part doesn't feel bad. Feels pretty good, actually. All that old time religion may have been wrong about what constitutes sinning but the part about the truth setting you free? Might not have been the worst advice. Maybe that's another thing he can keep. 

"They'll be there," he tells her, a smile in his voice that he feels in his bones. 

When he ducks back inside and slips into his seat next to Hardison, he presses in closer against him than he needs to, even with the crowds. 

"Everything okay?" Hardison asks, leaning in so only Eliot can hear. 

"Yeah," he says. "Everything's good." 

+  
The team goes their separate ways that night, all of them standing in a circle on one of the pedestrian bridges over the Liffey, looking as pleased as it is possible to be. And given the amount of money they each just made, it is _very_ pleased. 

"I cannot believe this amount of money is from one job," Nish says, staring at the checks Hardison's passing out. "Is this real?" 

"Very real," Hardison assures him, grinning. "I'm very good at what I do." 

"I'm going to Paris," Jess says dreamily, gazing at the zeros on her check. "No, Milan. No, Barcelona. No, all of them." 

"I might hang around here for a while," Ryan says, looking around. "Head over to Malahide, scope out the rich tourists. Sell a castle I don't own to some of my fellow Americans who don't know any better. You know. Normal stuff." 

"Your willingness to waltz right into another con just after a multimillion dollar job frightens me a bit, but I do respect the hustle," Nish tells them, and they just smile. 

"It's back home for me," Dani says, folding the check and placing it carefully in a pocket inside her jacket. "This has been fun, but you know, we said one job, and I've got that tournament...so...." 

Her voice trails off as the others nod. They all look at Parker, then Hardison, then Eliot, like they're waiting for someone to invite them to stay. 

But Parker, who knows better than to overplay her hand, just puts her hands in her jacket pockets, bounces a little on her feet, and says, "Well, it's been fun! You all did great work. Enjoy your very large piles of money." 

Eliot watches the four of them react to this, the surprise and disappointment that ripples across their faces as they realize that yeah, this was it, they said one job, and the job's done. He doesn't know exactly what game Parker's playing, but he trusts her, so he clears his throat and adds, "Yeah, you did pretty good. If you're ever in Portland, feel free to stop by the Fulcrum." 

"We will be making you pay for your beer," Hardison says. "Because it's not like we don't know y'all can afford it." 

The group chuckles a little. Jess runs her fingers over the numbers on her check in a way that reminds him of Parker and her money. Must be a thief thing. 

He stands with Hardison and Parker and watches them scatter. Dani and Jess go one way, Nish and Ryan the other, and then when they hit the end of the bridge they split again, wandering away into the night alone. God, that feeling. He remembers walking off after they stuck it to Dubenich the first time, feeling like he was walking on air from the big old check in his pocket, but at the same time a little sad that it was over and he had to leave these weirdos forever. It wasn't that he liked any of them, mind. It was just that they worked very well together and made him an absurd amount of money. 

And-- maybe he liked them a little. 

He looks at Hardison and Parker and smiles. "They'll be back," he says. 

"Yeah, I think they would have said yes to another job right there," Hardison says.

"Hmm. I give it precisely eight days," Parker says, linking her arms through theirs. "I'm pretty much counting on it." 

+

They catch another overnight flight home, ten hours nonstop to Seattle and then a quick connector home. They sit together, Hardison in the window, Eliot on the aisle, and Parker happily sandwiched between them. Hardison's the first to fall asleep, which isn't a surprise. Parker drifts in and out but mostly seems content just to stay quiet, leaving him awake with his thoughts. He thinks about the menu for a while, about how much alcohol they need to order to make all the drinks they're going to sell, about what kind of drinks they can make that don't have alcohol for all the people like Lisha who can't have it. Nobody's getting left behind at this party. 

Well, he might. He still doesn't get the parade. He's better than he was when he started trying to sort all this shit out in his head, but it still seems like there's a big difference between just living your life and living it that loud. And he's not cutting his hair. He's definitely not getting a tattoo. Where that leaves him, he doesn't know. 

Somewhere over the Atlantic, Parker flips up the seat rest that separates the two of them and huddles up next to him. 

"What are you doing snuggling up to me, huh?" he asks, putting his arm around her. 

"Hardison took my blanket, and you're warm," she tells him, and he glances over at Hardison, who is passed out against the window, half-sprawled into Parker's seat, one blanket across his chest and what is probably Parker's missing blanket tangled over his lap. Eliot shakes his head and grabs the blanket from the seat pocket in front of him, pulls it out of its wrapping, then drapes it around Parker's shoulders. 

"Better?" he asks, and she nods. She's quiet for a minute. He runs his hand through her hair and thinks about what he would do if this were Hardison instead of her. A few months ago, hell, maybe even a few weeks ago, he doesn't know that he could have done it without fighting it. Now he's pretty sure he'd be okay. Maybe he doesn't get the parade. At least he gets these people. 

Parker shifts against him, jostling him out of his thoughts. "Why are you awake?" 

"Didn't feel like sleeping," he grunts. "What about you?" 

She shrugs. "Thinking about the job. Running everything back in my brain." 

"Hey, you did good. You did real good," he assures her, and he can feel her smile. "Did I tell you that already?" 

"Hm. A few times," she says, patting his chest, "so I must have done really well."

"I'm proud," he tells her. "I can't be proud of you?' 

"You can, but you don't usually say it." 

"It's a new thing I'm trying," he says, looking down at her. She tips her face up and smiles. "Saying stuff out loud. What do you think?" 

"I like it," she says, and he leans over to kiss the top of her head. "Are you okay?' 

"Well," he says, "I just made a ton of money and I've got a pretty lady next to me. Why wouldn't I be okay?" 

"I don't know," she shrugs. "I'm awake because I'm thinking. You seem like you're thinking, too." 

"Right now it seems like I'm being talked at," he grumbles, but he's not actually bothered, and she is neither deterred nor fooled by his grumbling. 

"Hardison told me to ask you about a parade?" 

"Dammit, Hardison," he mutters. "Yeah. There's a parade in Portland next month. It's uh, Portland Pride. Gay pride. Queer? Whatever. You know what I mean."

"Hmm. I like parades," she says. "They make good distractions. I stole three thousand dollars and two hundred and six watches at a parade when I was thirteen. And some rings. Maybe a necklace." 

"That's-- I'm not gonna say that's not impressive, but we aren't stealing from people at this one, Parker," he says. 

"Are we going to be in the parade?" 

"No." 

"Then what?" 

"The bar's hosting an afterparty. Thought it'd be good for the business." 

"Ooh," she says. "Do we get to wear costumes? Will there be glitter?" 

"I don't really think-- honestly I have no idea," he says, because now that he considers it, it's entirely possible that there will be costumes. "But that's a big no on the glitter. Last thing we need is a lawsuit because someone slipped on it." 

"Oh, fine," she sighs. "Is that what you were thinking about? The parade?" 

"Yeah. We need drinks," he says. "Something we can serve quickly. Gotta test some cocktails out when we get back, start ordering fruit, figure out a menu." 

"Hmm," she says. 

"You got a comment on that?" 

"No, but you usually look different when you're thinking about the menu," she tells him, and pulls back just enough that he can see her face. She does something with her face that makes her look sort of mean, but also thoughtful. "Like this." 

"I don't think I ever look like that," he says, frowning. "I hope I don't ever look like that." 

"It's your _thinking about food_ face," she shrugs. She pats his arm. "It looks better on you." 

"Okay," he says. "I'll take your word for it." 

She settles back against his side and readjusts her blanket. "You weren't making that face, before. What were you thinking about?" 

"It's nothing," he says, which earns him a poke in the ribs. "Ow, jesus, don't do that." 

"You can still talk to me, Eliot," she says. "I thought we had a rule." 

"Yeah," he says, joking. "Give Parker what she wants." 

"No," she says, pulling away from him so he can see more of her face, and he realizes that he might have been joking, but Parker wasn't. "Not that one. The actual rule. The one where if anybody feels left out, they say so, and I do. _I_ feel left out." 

"Oh," he says, blinking. "Shit. Why?" 

"I know I don't understand any of this the way Hardison understands it, but I'm part of this too," she reminds him. "Maybe I can help. Maybe I can't. Either way, I'm here, but you just talk to Hardison." 

"A lot of it is-- it's just sort of about him and me," Eliot says. 

"Not all of it," she says, waving her hand between them. Huh. Present situation excluded, he doesn't exactly hold onto Parker in public, either, does he. 

"Look, I'm not trying to make an excuse, here, but you've been busy," he says. "I know that job wasn't easy to plan, and I know you lost sleep over it. You didn't need to lose sleep over this, too. This stuff's on me to figure out." 

She pokes his arm this time. "You told me before that when I gave you space to deal with your feelings I didn't have to give you a whole universe, or whatever," she says. "You don't have to do that with me either. Let me help. At least let me listen. Don't leave me out." 

"Okay," he says, and holds his arm out. "Could you come back over here first?" 

"Yeah," she sighs, and settles back against his side. He pulls her close and rests his chin on the top of her head for her a second. 

"I'm sorry I left you out," he says. "But I appreciate you saying something about it." 

"You were right, before," she says. "It's a good rule to have. I don't like this feeling." 

"Yeah, me either," he grumbles. "I have had a whole lot of feelings lately I did not enjoy." 

"Tell me about them," she says, so he tries. 

"I just don't really know how to do this, or be this, or whatever," he sighs. "And I'm a little annoyed that I have to think about it at all."

"Be what?" 

"That's just it, I don't know. Hardison, he's just Hardison," Eliot says, gesturing to the window seat where Hardison is peacefully sleeping. "The new kids, they're all just themselves. And they all fine with each other, like they know some kind of secret hand signal that just tells them right off the bat they're all part of the same queer club or whatever. I don't have any of that." 

"Hmm. Maybe you're thinking it's like costumes," she says, in a thoughtful voice. "But I don't know if it is." 

"What?" 

"Well, maybe not costumes, exactly, but like-- the things we wear on a job. The things that tell people that you fit in somewhere, that you belong there so nobody asks you questions. And if you don't have one, because it doesn't fit, or you don't want to wear it, you don't know how to tell people that you belong there." 

"Huh," he says, considering that. 

"I mean I guess the costumes aren't costumes, they're probably sort of real, here," she continues, "but I don't think that's the only way people know they belong to each other. I know you belong to us." 

"Yeah, but other people don't necessarily know that." 

"Do you want them to?" 

"Yes," he says, before he has a chance to think about it or talk himself out of it. He does want people to know they belong together. More people than just Jordan or the brunch people, or the Pride parade people, or even the team. And sure, he could keep his head down, let people assume what they wanted, and firmly tell himself that it's nobody's business. It's worked for most of his life, no reason it shouldn't work now. 

Except-- what's the goddamn point of promising yourself to people, of belonging to those people, if you're not giving them everything you have? He's not about to give less of his heart or his life to these two people than he gave to the army, or less of his time than he's given a decade of half-hearted romances or one-night stands. Hardison and Parker deserve better than that. He told them he was in, and if he's in, then just like Hardison's piss poor poker strategy, he's all in, every hand, every time. So probably he ought to just be himself anyway, and hell, who knows, that might even be enough, even if it's quiet. Whether you're Kat and their eighteen ear piercings and multicolored hair or you're Eliot and both by nature and professional necessity you keep a lot of yourself under wraps, maybe there's room for everyone. Who can say. When you live your whole life trying to be quiet it probably feels damn good to make some noise every once in a while, and _that_ is when he thinks he finally understands the damn parades. 

He smiles a little bit. Honestly, maybe he should just let Parker figure everything out that bothers him from now on.

Parker pokes at his arm. "Did I break you?" 

"No," he says. "I was just thinking."

"Okay," she says. She nestles in a little closer. "I don't think you need a costume, if that isn't what you want. There are other ways to belong to people. Maybe you just need to find what that means for you, with this. Let yourself belong to somebody, like you let yourself belong to us. Maybe that's enough." 

He thinks about the warmth and joy of hearing someone call these people his partners with the full weight of what that actually means behind it, and yeah, that's enough. 

He leans over and kisses her, soft and gentle and sweet. 

"Did I help?" she asks, afterwards. 

He brings her hand up over his heart and squeezes her fingers gently. "Yeah," he tells her. "Yeah, I think you did." 

She smiles and yawns. "Good. I'm going to try and sleep now."

"Me, too," he says, yawning himself. He closes his eyes and leans back, and Parker snuggles against him, resting her cheek against his chest, and he runs his fingers through her hair, and he sort of wishes he had the middle seat so he could have his arms around both of them. But his job is keeping them safe, so wherever they go, for the rest of their lives, he's always going to be on the aisle, a quiet expression of how much loves them. Maybe he could be less quiet about it. He did mean what he said about saying stuff out loud, so-- eyes closed but heart open, he mumbles, "I love you, Parker," before he can talk himself out of it. 

"I love you, too, Eliot," she replies, and he's happy and peaceful and about to drift off when from the window seat, they hear, "What about old Alec Hardison? Anybody love him?" 

"Thought you were asleep," Eliot says, smiling as he opens one eye and squints over at Hardison in the dim light. 

"Oh, I was," Hardison says, "but I'm awake now that y'all are over there making out and confessing your love for each other." 

"You already know that I love you," Parker tells him, and Hardison smiles back at her. 

"I do, and I love you too, Parker." he says. "Glad _somebody_ loves me." 

"Hardison," Eliot growls, "I love you very much." 

"I know. I love you too," Hardison says. He stretches one of his long arms behind Parker, and Eliot moves his arm from around Parker for a second so he can reach up and wrap his fingers around Hardison's, and it's all very fucking sentimental and sweet and whatever, and maybe he has enough of this figured out that it can just be like this from now on. 

"This is a good triangle," Parker yawns, and then shifts around so that her back is against Eliot's side, with his arm still around her waist, and her feet are in Hardison's lap. Everybody's warm and happy, and he doesn't wake up until they turn the lights on for breakfast.

+

**Tuesday, May 7th, 2013**

_**The Fulcrum-- Happy Hour: Mocktail Special** _

**_Pride & Joy._ ** _Blueberry ginger simple syrup, citrus flavored sparkling water, mint garnish._

"Is this for the parade weekend?" Parker asks, taking a sip of the drink Eliot passes her. 

"Yeah," Eliot tells her. "I'm experimenting with batch drinks. Things we can mix up a bunch of ahead of time and serve fast and easy, with or without alcohol. Thoughts?" 

"It's good. Refreshing," she says. She slides it over to Hardison. "Try this." 

"Don't mind if I do," he says. "Mmm. That's good. Nice name, by the way." 

"I wasn't trying to be cute," Eliot says. "It's a song. But I guess it works both ways, huh." He smirks a little. "Not that I know anything about that." 

"Of course not," Hardison chuckles. 

"What's the song about?" Parker asks, stealing the drink back from Hardison. 

"Uh, love, I guess," Eliot says. "No, I will not sing it for you right now. I got work to do." 

"You were just listening to love songs and thinking about us, but you weren't trying to be cute?" Hardison smiles. "Good to know." 

"Get away from my bar," Eliot grumbles, but he's smiling.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The drink at the end, "Pride and Joy," is named after one of my favorite Stevie Ray Vaughan & Double Trouble songs.


	9. mixed berry cobbler.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Party planning and an unexpected visitor.

On Wednesday afternoon after they get back from Dublin, Lisha shows up to talk about the Pride stuff. Eliot makes small talk for a second before Hardison and Parker get there and tries to ignore the weird nervous energy he feels about introducing someone-- even a queer someone, even someone who already knows-- to his partners, with all the meaning that word has, right out in the open for everyone to see it. 

Parker appears a few minutes later, and before Eliot can say anything, hops up on the counter next to him, her feet on the barstool in front of her. 

"Hey." He taps the counter firmly. "Do you remember the conversation we had about you sitting on the counters out here?" 

"No, but I remember that we own this place, so I can sit where I want," she says, poking him in the arm. 

"That's not how that talk went at all," he says. 

Parker just shrugs and turns to Lisha and holds out her hand. "I'm Parker." 

Lisha, who has been watching this whole interaction with something that could best be described as gleeful delight, shakes her hand firmly. "Lisha. So nice to meet you." 

"And I'm just the guy who cleans the counters around here because he doesn't want any health code violations," Eliot grumbles, glaring over at Parker. "Just so we're clear." 

"We're clear," Parker beams. 

"Hey," Hardison says, sliding into the seat next to Lisha. He holds his hand out to her, introduces himself, then looks over at Parker and then at Eliot. "How come she gets to sit on the counter?" 

"Well," Eliot sighs, trying and failing to keep the smile off his face as he gestures at both of them, "these are my people." 

"Amazing," she says, propping her chin on her hands and staring a little. "Sorry, I hope that isn't too weird. I've been single for...a while." 

"That's rough, buddy," Hardison says. 

"Did you just quote--" Lisha starts to say, and Hardison grins, and Eliot and Parker are lost as they talk animatedly about some nerd thing for a few minutes until finally Eliot clears his throat and they come back to earth. 

They go over the afterparty details-- Parker is delighted to learn that there are themed t-shirts-- and Eliot asks a lot of questions about what kind of food and drinks might work, and Hardison asks a lot of financial questions about sponsorship levels, and about forty five minutes later they've got the whole thing worked out. 

"Hey, I need to run and talk to some of the staff, but if you ever want to talk about your Avatar opinions, you just let me know," Hardison says. "Eliot can give you my number." 

"Absolutely," Lisha says, waving as he walks away.

"It was nice to meet you, but I should go too," Parker says. She leans over to peck Eliot on the cheek before she hops off the counter. "See you later." 

Eliot calls after her, waving a towel. "Hey, you want to wipe that counter down before you go? No? Parker? Parker, I know you can hear me," he calls, but Parker has already run into Amy and is pointedly ignoring him. He just shakes his head and looks at Lisha. "You want some unsolicited advice? Stay single." 

She grins. "I don't know, those are two gorgeous people you've got there. I'm a little jealous, not gonna lie. You're just, wow, out here living the bisexual dream, huh?" 

He would probably never have considered putting it that way on his own, but he finds, as he stands here and watches as Parker laughs with Amy and Hardison, that he's not really bothered. 

"Never really thought about it like that, but yeah," he agrees. "Maybe so." 

"This is me soliciting advice," she says. "How did you manage that?" 

"Honestly?" he says, looking back at her. "I didn't do a damn thing except say yes." 

"Goals," she sighs. She gathers up all their paperwork. "Well, thanks again for all of this. I know I already said this but I'm just really excited that this place is here." 

"Glad to be here," he says, and God, ain't that the truth. "Tell you what, you want one of these mocktails to go? I'm testing drinks for Pride." 

"Am I breathing? Then I want one of your mocktails," Lisha says, and he smiles and fills up a plastic cup with some of the _Pride & Joy_ batch syrup and some citrus soda water from the gun, adds a lid and straw, and passes it over.

"Enjoy," he says, and she grins, takes a long swig, and sighs. 

"Perfect," she says. "Hey, thanks for making such good non-alcoholic drinks, by the way? I think it's really hard for a lot of us who can't drink to enjoy Pride sometimes, the parties are just a lot." 

"I can imagine," he murmurs. "Hope this helps." 

"It does," she says, and raises her plastic cup in toast. "See you later!" 

"Later," he smiles. She's a sweet kid. One of these days he'll have to find a way to thank her for unknowingly helping him figure some of this stuff out. Maybe he'll make a mocktail and name it after her. 

She hasn't been gone two minutes before Kat and Brady are standing in front of the bar. 

"Soooo. Did we hear that right?" Brady asks. 

Eliot raises an eyebrow. "Hmm? Hear what?" 

Kat looks at Brady and then back at Eliot. "Are we an afterparty host site for Pride, or not?" 

Eliot nods. "We might be," he says, purposefully cagey, just to get on their nerves a little. This backfires in a fucking spectacular way when instead of the grumbling and groaning and cries of _Come on, Eliot_ he's expecting, he gets hit full force with two hopeful, expectant faces that look sadder and sadder the longer he's quiet, and he folds like a house of cards. 

"Okay, okay," he says, holding up his hands. "Yes, we are, now stop looking at me like you just lost your best friend." 

"Awesome," Kat says, smiling. 

"Guess I won't call in queer to work that day to go the parade after all," Brady jokes, and Eliot frowns. He hadn't considered that this was probably like gay Christmas, or something, and that maybe the staff would want to be out in the street instead of trapped inside at work. 

"Hey, uh, if you want the day, you can have it," he says. "We'll figure it out." 

"Are you kidding, no, I need the money," Brady says. "Tuition doesn't pay itself. At least this way I can sort of feel like I got to be part of the party, even if I'm working." 

"I hear that," Kat sighs. 

"Did you go back to school?" Eliot says. He remembers them mentioning it. 

"Not yet," they say. "Trying to save up for the fall. Hospitality management. Third time's the charm. Maybe some of this practical menu experience will help me stick it out this time." 

"You gotta show me something first," he points out. "Quit being nervous and pick something. It's gonna be fine." 

"Okay, okay," they grin. "But not right now. These tables don't wait on themselves." 

"No kidding," says Brady, and they both smile at him and then hurry off to different parts of the restaurant. 

Eliot watches them go and makes a mental note to have Hardison make up some kind of scholarship for both of them. He can take it out of his cut from this last job and he won't even miss it, and they'll never have to know where it came from or who. Hardison's gonna give him shit about sad kids again, but that's fine. 

Hardison's still talking to Parker and Amy and he would just do it right now, but then he remembers that he needs to wipe down the counter where Parker was sitting, muttering to himself about rules but also smiling the whole time. He figures as long as he's doing it he might as well wipe down the whole thing, which is why he doesn't see the moment that Vance walks into his bar. 

"Excuse me," says a familiar voice. "I'm looking for somebody to join a dance team, you think you can help me out?" 

"Well," he says, as Vance takes a seat at the bar in front of him, "look at what the cat dragged in." 

"You haven't been returning my calls, and I was in the neighborhood, so I thought I'd just stop by," Vance says. 

"Great," Eliot says, and relaxes just a little when out of the corner of his eye he sees that Hardison and Parker, who were still in the restaurant, have noticed Vance and disappeared into the back. "You gonna arrest me this time?" 

"Hey, no hard feelings, right?" Vance laughs. "How's the shoulder?" 

"Fine," Eliot says. "It's been fine. Leg's fine, too, thanks for asking." 

"Like that was gonna slow you down," Vance says, and Eliot shrugs.

"You here just to devil me, or you want a beer and something to eat?" 

"No reason I can't do both," Vance says, and Eliot passes him a menu. "You look different." 

"I got a haircut," Eliot tells him. 

"That's not it," Vance says, squinting at him. "Looked like that when you were in DC. This is something else." 

Eliot shrugs. "Same old me. What's your poison?"

Vance barely even looks at the menu. "This is your place, right?" 

"Mine and my partners'," he says, but of course Vance isn't gonna catch that. This conversation is really remarkably different from the one of moments before, and he never thought he'd have more in common with a twenty-two year old queer kid than with someone he was in the trenches with, but here he is, gritting his teeth. "But it's my food on the menu, yeah." 

"Well then," Vance says, pushing the menu back. "Give me whatever. I know I'm in good hands." 

Eliot thinks for just a minute, then turns to the POS and types a couple things in before picking up a tall glass and filling it up with their new lager. He slides it across the bartop. "Try that on for size." 

Vance takes a sip. "That's a damn fine beer," he says appreciatively.

"Got you a burger to go with it," Eliot tells him. "Should be out in a few minutes." 

"Nice," Vance replies. "Hey, listen, speaking of food-- Theresa's never stopped talking about that steak dish you made us last time you visited. Seriously. You're gonna have to come back some time. I can take out a nuclear warhead mid-launch but I can't do that." 

Eliot does grin at that. "The way I remember it, you had some help with the warhead, too." 

"Yeah, yeah," Vance laughs, and he looks like he's about to launch right into the job stuff again, but Eliot is temporarily rescued by Kat, who appears with a burger and pommes frites. 

"Enjoy!" they say, as they settle the plate in front of Vance. 

"Thanks, Kat," Eliot says warmly, and they give him an oddly reassuring smile before they walk away. 

Vance looks after them as they walk off to check on their other tables. "God, Portland's such a weird town." 

Eliot bristles a little at that, but Vance is too busy eating his burger to notice. At least it keeps him from making any more comments. Eliot is pretty sure he could win that fight if he needed to, but it's not like he's itching to try. 

"This is a really good burger, man, just really good. My family would love this, just saying," Vance says. "Look, I won't lie, I had an ulterior motive for calling you. Not just for the job, which believe me, we are not done talking about. Theresa's got this friend." 

Oh, hell. This is the last thing he needs. Eliot holds up his hands. "Vance--" 

"I know, I know, last time was a bad idea, I told her that, but this gal's different." 

Last time. Jesus, he'd almost forgotten. It was a barbeque, and he'd been minding the grill, which suited him just fine, except that Vance's wife Theresa had decided that Eliot and the only single girl from her Bible study group were a match made in heaven, and she'd basically assigned the poor gal to sous chef duty for the evening. She was a sweet little brunette from North Texas who loved scrapbooking, wine coolers, and Jesus, so basically about as far from his current situation as it was possible to be. Even if he wasn't practically married, whoever Theresa has lined up is guaranteed to be a bad idea, and he shakes his head. 

"I'll cook _steak au poivre_ for you anytime, man, but you don't need to set me up with anybody," Eliot says, laughing. "I'm good. Real good, actually." 

"Huh," Vance says, narrowing his eyes at Eliot. Vance snaps his fingers suddenly. "Knew something was different. Happy's a good look on you, she got a name?" 

Well, shit.

Eliot quickly weighs his options. He could make somebody up. Wouldn't even be hard. Or he could just say Parker and be done with it. Wouldn't even be a lie. But it also wouldn't be the truth. And the truth, for better or worse, is that he'd sooner cut his own heart out of his chest than cut Hardison out of this just so he can pretend to feel like someone he doesn't even want to be for an hour, so he takes a deep breath, steadies himself, and says, "You met 'em." He clears his throat and folds his arms over his chest. " _Both_ of them. In DC." 

Well, now it's out there. The cat's so far out of the bag it's in another county, and he won't ever get to call it back. Vance stares at him. He stares back. 

"You serious?" Vance asks. Eliot never breaks eye contact, just nods slightly. This was so much easier when it was Jordan. 

Vance takes a long, slow drink of his beer, sets it down, and says, "Goddammit. You just lost me a thousand bucks." 

At that, Eliot blinks. "What?" 

"Some of the guys were talking after you left," he shrugs. "We all saw you together. You remember Rodriguez? He's-- well, you know." 

_Say the goddamn word_ , Eliot wants to say, which is really rich coming from him, since he can't even really say it all the time, and it is him. God, how many fucking times has he stumbled through conversations just like Vance is doing now, unable to even acknowledge the barest piece of someone's humanity? He owes all those people a beer, probably. All those queer people. His people. Jesus. This should not have to be so hard. 

"Anyway," Vance continues, "he said there wasn't any way in hell the three of you weren't shacking up, and I said there wasn't any way in hell that you were, and maybe we made a little friendly wager." 

"Right. Because you thought that can't possibly be a guy like me?" 

"Maybe, but mostly because I thought if you managed to actually _settle down_ with somebody, you'd tell me, you son of a bitch," Vance says. 

"Not something that's easy to say," Eliot replies. "People expect things out of you. There's a lot of different ways to be a man." 

"Spencer, you've saved my ass at least seven times-- eight if you count that little thing we're not supposed to mention in Cairo-- and I'm not gonna tell you I get it, because I don't, but I'm also not gonna sit here and question your manhood over it. It's a little weird, though." 

"You and I are going to have different opinions on that, I think," Eliot says quietly. 

"I mean, you have to admit, three people? It's a little weird," Vance says. "Maybe if it was you and two women--" 

"It's not that weird," Eliot interrupts, because he really doesn't want to walk down that conversational road. "We've seen way weirder shit in our line of work and you know it." 

"Okay. It's just, you know. Me and Theresa barely manage to deal with each other sometimes," Vance shrugs, and Eliot does not tell him that maybe if he treated Theresa with a little more respect and romance every so often they'd deal just fine. "Another person seems like a whole lot more work."

"More risk, more rewards," Eliot jokes, because he really doesn't want to have this conversation anymore. "You want another beer?" 

"If it's another one of yours, I do," Vance says, and Eliot nods. "Oh hey, forgot to tell you, I got video of Tommy's first varsity game." 

"Pull it up," Eliot says, grateful for the subject change, and fills another glass. He fills one for himself, too, because jesus fucking christ. 

He is going to have a long drink and an even longer talk with Hardison later about all of this, because while on the whole this conversation is probably going better than he could have imagined it would, it also just doesn't all sit right. Still, he'll sit here, and he'll watch high school football videos of Vance's kid, and that'll be fine. It's not Tommy's fault. And like it or not, they do have history, and that still counts for something, even if Vance is gonna sit here and call the best thing that ever happened to him weird. He's the only one who gets to do that. It is a very _only family can talk shit about family_ sort of rule, but that's very Oklahoma and very home, so it makes sense to Eliot. 

They talk shop for another hour after that, and Vance tries three more times, unsuccessfully, to recruit him for another gig. 

"Really never thought I'd see the day," Vance says, shaking his head and finishing his beer. "I'm glad you're happy, I guess, but those two people of yours cost me a hell of a good soldier." 

"Somebody has to keep them safe," Eliot says. "I made a promise. You know that means something." 

"Sure, but I promised Theresa," Vance says. He taps the bartop. "And I still go do my duty." 

"Yeah, but I bet Theresa doesn't regularly hack into the Russian mob's bank accounts or fling herself off the world's tallest skyscrapers," Eliot points out. 

Vance whistles. "No. No she does not." 

Eliot picks up a napkin and writes a number on it, then slides it across the bartop.

"Name's Quinn. He's no patriot, and he'll care about the money more than the job. But he'll get it done and he won't run his mouth about it later. Can't ask for more than that." 

"Can't say I'm happy about it not being you, but I'll give him a call." Vance slips the napkin into his pocket, drains his beer, stands, and holds out his hand. "Congratulations on your retirement. And your weird relationship." 

"Thank you," Eliot says, shaking his hand, even though he's not _retired_ , that's for damn sure. But if Vance wants to think he's gay and retired, well, that suits him just fine. He's tired of trying to explain to Vance why he can't do this shit for him anymore. "Don't tell people I'm retired. I don't need people showing up here thinking _retired_ means _soft_ , because then I'll just have to hand them their asses, and I got a business to run." 

"Deal," Vance says. "But-- I can tell 'em the other thing?" 

"Yep," Eliot says. He grins. "Don't want you to be the only dumbass out there losing money." 

Vance heads out the door a minute or two later, and Eliot waits until he sees him cross the street and get into a big black Tahoe and drive off before he lets out the breath he's been holding. 

"Well, shit," he mutters to himself. "That happened." 

He's still standing at the bar when Kat comes over and asks about a bunch of drinks for their table.

"I thought I put the order in," they say, and he glances over at the POS.

"Aw, hell. I'm sorry, Kat," he says, reaching over to grab the ticket. Kat comes behind the bar and starts grabbing glasses, but he frowns and waves them off. "Here, let me do that. Didn't see that ticket print out. Just got a little distracted, I guess." 

"It's really no problem," Kat says. "This table's a bunch of regulars, they're all pretty chill. I'll get the beers if you'll do the cocktails." 

"Deal," he says, and together they get everything assembled in a couple of minutes. 

"Oh," Kat says, looking at the glasses on their tray before they head off. They frown, counting glasses. "There was supposed to be a shot of tequila here, too." 

"Well?" 

"No, uh, the Tanteo jalapeno," Kat says. 

"Nice choice," he says, and they smile as he pours the shot. "Shit, did they want it chilled? I can bring it over there if they can give me a second." 

"It's fine," Kat says, and he shrugs and sets it on the bartop in front of them. 

Kat gives him a sly smile and pushes it back in his direction, saying, "Chill it if you want, it's for you." 

He frowns. "Huh?" 

"Listen," they say, looking back at the door where Vance just left and then back at Eliot again, "I wasn't eavesdropping and I didn't hear any of that, so no worries, but fuck, do I know _that_ feel. But-- you did it. You're still breathing."

"Thanks," he says, and raises the shot glass in their direction before gulping the tequila down. It's a pleasant spicy burn, which is a nice distraction from how emotional he feels about the fact that someone noticed and knew what was going on, which he kind of thought would be upsetting, but which is actually just sort of comforting. It's a very _we take care of our own_ sort of sentiment, which is something he understands pretty well. Maybe Hardison and Parker are right. Maybe he doesn't need a weird haircut and a tattoo or a certain kind of clothes to belong, and at that moment he realizes that he just really needs to find one or both of those people and hold them for a while, so he sets the shot glass down and looks at Kat, who's still standing there, like they're trying to make sure he's okay. "Uh. I gotta take off for a while, if you all are okay down here." 

"Sure, get out of here, me and Brady can handle it and Jordan will be here soon for his shift, anyway. We got this," Kat says, picking up the tray of drinks easily with one hand while with their other hand they point between their eyes and his in the universally understood gesture for _I've got my eye on you_. "And don't you dare take that shot off my tab. That's on me."

"You got it," he says, and as he heads back to the apartment, he feels warm from more than just the tequila.

He finds Hardison first, standing at the desk downstairs, working on some kind of code. Eliot stands there watching him work for a long time, that big old brain deconstructing strings of numbers and putting them back together again so they'll do what he wants. He hears a noise above him and looks up to see Parker in some of her rigging, dangling from a beam near the ceiling, and he just shakes his head and smiles. He can't believe he spent so many years telling himself he didn't need these people. They are the strangest, most inexplicable people he has ever met, but they're his, and he's theirs. 

He walks over to Hardison, takes the keyboard out of his hands, and holds onto him tight. 

"Oh," Hardison says, and after the briefest startled pause, wraps his arms around Eliot. "Hey. You okay?" 

"Yeah, I'm good," he says gruffly. He still feels weird, and he hates himself a little-- okay, maybe a lot-- for considering even for a second not openly acknowledging to anyone, to Vance, to the whole goddamn world how important this man is to him. It matters, it always mattered, even when he told himself it didn't. 

Hardison's voice rumbles through him like a freight train. "Holy shit. You told him, didn't you?" 

"Yeah," Eliot says, and Hardison pulls away and points at the chair closest to him. 

"Sit," Hardison tells him, so he does. "You sure you're okay?" 

"Why wouldn't I be okay?" he asks. 

Hardison scratches his chin, reaches out for Eliot's hand, and says, "Oh, I don't know. Maybe because coming out to someone like that is hard?" 

"What? No, I didn't-- I mean, I never said I was-- I just-- shit," he says, blinking, because that is what that was, huh. "Oh, shit. Goddamn." 

Hardison lets him process this for a minute before asking, "You still good?" 

"Does it matter? I mean, it's done," he shrugs. "Doesn't really change the outcome, no matter how I feel about it. Cat's out of the bag." 

"Well, as someone who loves you, I care how you feel even if you don't," Hardison says. 

"Okay? I guess? I mean, he didn't seem that surprised," Eliot says, frowning, "which is kind of upsetting. Not because I care if he knows, I mean I told him, so I don't, I just-- I don't know." 

"Ah," Hardison says, nodding. "That's always fun. It's like, here you are, pretty convinced that you are very, very good at hiding it and it's like, all your effort was just a waste."

"Hmm." 

"I think it's worse because our line of work kind of depends on us being able to be different people convincingly," Hardison continues. "So it's kind of a slap in the face personally and professionally." 

"Yeah," Eliot says again. "That makes sense. But you pretended to be a diamond thief called the Ice Man, so I don't know how good you ever were." 

"Come on, come on now," Hardison says, and Eliot laughs, and he really doesn't feel that weird anymore. "I'm letting that go on account of this momentous occasion, but don't think we're not coming back to that." 

"Well, I guess you got me pretty good," Eliot says. "So that's one successful grift for you." 

"I did," Hardison says, squeezing his hand. "Don't you forget it." 

"Hey!" Parker's voice calls. There's a jangling sound and then a whooshing noise and then she and her rigging appear from the ceiling, setting her down with a thump right on the table between them. "What about me? _We_ had a plan, remember? Both of us. The whole roof farm thing? My idea." 

"And it was a really good idea, baby," Hardison tells her. 

"This was a really good idea," Eliot tells them. "It was all a really good idea." 

+

 **Sunday, May 12th, 2013**

**The Fulcrum Dessert Menu-- Special**

_**Mixed berry cobbler.** Cherries, blackberries, & blueberries topped with pastry, just like mama used to make. Served with a big scoop of housemade Madagascar vanilla bean ice cream. _

"This is delicious. Too bad cherries aren't pink, though," Hardison says. "Kinda threw your color palette off." 

Eliot shrugs. "I mean, if you me want to keep the color palette, I'm probably gonna just end up throwing fruit on top of some crème brûlée. Which we can do, but that ain't gonna work for a Pride afterparty. Way too fussy." 

"Aren't Goji berries pink?" Parker asks. She takes about half the ice cream in one scoop. "Put those in here." 

"You can't put Goji berries in a _cobbler_ , Eliot says, horrified. 

"Watermelon?" Parker suggests. Even Hardison makes a face at that, and his idea of home-cooking is a Hot Pocket.

"That's worse than Goji berries, Parker, if I put that in here it'll just dissolve," Eliot says. 

"There's gotta be a pink fruit out there that will work," Hardison says. "I mean, this is really, really good, though, man." 

"Thanks," he says, grabbing a spoon of his own. "I'll keep working on it."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Would Vance have been even the moderate amount of chill that he was about Eliot coming out like that? Probably not! But it's 2020, everything's shit, and your writer is old, gay, and tired of homophobia, so I made him a halfway decent person! You're welcome.


	10. menu tasting night.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eliot settles some old personal business, and the new team settles up on a bet.

Eliot strolls into the bar during dinner service to find Jess, Dani, Nish, and Ryan sitting around a four top in the middle of the restaurant. Dani spots him first and gives him a sheepish little wave, and then all of the others look up too and do variations on the same theme. Eight days on the dot. Parker will be pleased. She also probably has some kind of plan, so instead of going over to ruffle their feathers he just smirks and walks on by, all the way to where Hardison's sitting at the corner of the bar, laptop open, typing away, with an empty seat to his right that Eliot slides into. 

"Hey," he says. "Did you see who's here?" 

Hardison grins. "I did. They've been here for about an hour. I texted Parker, she said she'd be down in a little while." 

"Guess her plan worked," Eliot says. "Not that I'm surprised." 

Kat appears from the other end of the bar and sets a water glass in front of Eliot. "Hey," they say, smiling. "What can I get you?" 

"Evening, Kat. Can I get a pale ale? Ours," he says. 

They nod and look to Hardison. "You need anything over there, boss?" 

"I'm good," Hardison tells them.

They reappear a few minutes later with Eliot's beer. "This one's on your tab, though," they say, and he smiles his thanks. 

Hardison nudges his arm. "What was that about?" 

"Inside joke," he says. "What are you working on over there?" 

"These books don't balance themselves," Hardison points out, and Eliot frowns. 

"Didn't you write software that specifically does that?" he asks. "So the books literally do balance themselves?" 

"Oh, they do," Hardison says. "That software _also_ alerts me to the fact that someone around here thinks it's fine to comp a bunch of meals lately." 

"Yeah, well, someone around here is still sitting on a fuckton of money from the first job we ever pulled," Eliot tells him, "so if he wants to comp a few meals for the Pride parade people, I think his boyfriend needs to cut him some fucking slack." 

"Wow," Hardison says, sitting back from his laptop.

"What?" 

"Nothing, it's just, I don't think you've ever called me your boyfriend outside of the apartment. Not even the other day." 

"Yeah, well," Eliot says, "I told you I was working on it. I worked on it." 

"I appreciate it," Hardison says. 

"I got something maybe you'll appreciate more than that," he says, leaning in so their shoulders are touching. "Listen-- I've been thinking since we talked, and maybe I should just kiss you." 

Hardison raises an eyebrow. "You think you're ready for that?" 

"Hell no," he says, and runs a hand through his hair. God, he's too old to be nervous about this shit. "But the thing is, I think I'm never going to be, so maybe I just have to...do it." He eyes Hardison, who's smiling. "You already knew that, didn't you?" 

Hardison nods. "Yeah, but I couldn't just _tell_ you the secret knowledge, you had to find it for yourself." 

"Don't say it like that, I'm not on some kind of gay quest, this isn't your weird game with all the elf people," Eliot grumbles. 

"Of course not," Hardison teases. "I mean, first of all, they're orcs, second of all, it's clearly a bisexual quest, not a gay one." 

"Fine. How much more of this shit do I have to do?" Eliot groans. 

"I regret to inform you that at least in my own personal experience, it is probably a lifelong process," Hardison says. His fingers brush against Eliot's arm. "But I'm here for you." 

"Well," Eliot sighs, leaning a little closer and slipping his left arm around the back of Hardison's chair, "at least the company's good." 

"I am pretty good company," Hardison agrees. He taps his chin thoughtfully and leans backward a little so his lower back presses against Eliot's arm where it rests on the chair "I don't think I get enough credit for that." 

"What kind of credit were you after, exactly," Eliot murmurs. He shuts the laptop with the arm he doesn't have around Hardison. Hardison's eyes are wide and both of them are breathing a little faster than they need to be, and their faces are so close now that Eliot would barely even have to lean in to kiss him. 

"I'm sure you can work something out," Hardison says, and they just look at each other for a second, and this is it, now or never, put or shut up, Eliot. 

How many times has he done this? Stood in some bar, flirted with some woman, kissed her, taken her home. This is different, but underneath all the baggage and the stuff he's tried to leave behind over the last few months, it's not that different. He wants it the same. Hell, he loves this man; he probably wants it more. So he wraps his fingers in Hardison's stupid t-shirt, pulls him close, and kisses him. There's this brief uncomfortable moment where he remembers he's not supposed to be doing this, and just firmly tells whatever leftover crap that is to fuck off and kisses Hardison harder. It's their goddamn bar. If a man can't kiss the man he loves in the corner of the bar they both own with their girlfriend, well, just try telling this man that, because he hasn't hit a single soul in a week, and he'll happily correct that on some homophobic piece of shit who stepped into the wrong bar on the wrong night. 

But nothing happens, except, if he does say so himself, a damn fine kiss. 

"You are, wow," Hardison murmurs, blinking, when he leans back. "You are very good at what you do, aren't you?" 

"I am," Eliot confirms, smiling slow and wide. He takes in the warm and slightly dazed look on Hardison's face and smiles wider. "Guess I still got it." 

"Uh, yes, yes you do," Hardison says. He shakes his head like he's trying to come back to earth, and Eliot takes a nice long drink of his beer. "You okay?" 

"World didn't stop," Eliot says, setting his beer back down. "At least, not in a bad way." 

"It didn't, did it," Hardison says, as Eliot runs his fingers casually up his arm. 

"Why don't we just find Parker and get out of here?" 

"I would love that," Hardison tells him, "but Parker's gonna want to talk to the new team, and I'm gonna need to sit here for just a minute." 

"Well, you know I never mind if you wanna take your time," Eliot drawls.

"You're the opposite of helpful right now," Hardison groans. 

"I think we both know I'm extremely helpful," Eliot says, grinning, and that point Parker materializes from somewhere and sandwiches herself between them, and they shift apart just enough to make room for her. 

"Thank God you're here," Hardison says to her. He points at Eliot. "Rescue me from this man. He's a menace." 

Parker wrinkles her nose at Hardison and turns to Eliot. "How are you a menace?" she asks, and Eliot gestures for her to lean closer so he can whisper in her ear. 

"Nod if you want to help me drive Hardison up the wall," he says quietly, and she does. "Okay. What you do is, laugh a little, and smile _real slow_. Perfect," he says, as she does exactly that, almost before he says it, because she has gotten very good at this, and he tells her so, growling into her ear in the way that always makes her shiver. 

"Y'all are killing me," Hardison groans, and Parker pulls away from Eliot, grinning. 

"You're right," she tells Eliot. "This is fun." 

"It's gonna be more fun later," he tells her, winking. 

Hardison mumbles something about bad people, and Parker laughs and takes Eliot's beer for herself, and somewhere in the middle of all of that he realizes that it's just a bunch of bullshit that he spent most of his life trying to deny himself all of this. He thinks about what he would say to that bright-eyed kid from Oklahoma who was trying so hard to be a good man on someone else's terms that he nearly lost himself entirely. God, what wouldn't he say? Potlucks are important life lessons. Tell your mother you love her more often. Don't listen to the fire and brimstone stuff so much at church. Who you are is not a mistake. 

Then again, if he'd come to that conclusion sooner, he probably wouldn't be sitting here with these two people right now, so maybe it was worth taking the long way home. And he is home, here, or wherever life takes them. They'll find it together. 

"You okay, man?" Hardison asks, breaking into his thoughts. He reaches around Parker to put his hand over Eliot's, and Parker puts hers over Hardison's. 

"Yeah," he says, clearing his throat. "I'm good." 

Hardison nudges his wrist. "Were you gonna get a little emotional over there?" 

" _No_ ," Eliot insists, although yeah, he was. "Can't I just enjoy my life for a minute without you making a big deal out of it?" 

"What part of your life were you enjoying, exactly?" Hardison asks. "The kissing? The successful gastropub? The seriously good job we just pulled last week? The kissing?" 

"It was probably the job," Parker says. "Or the kissing." 

"That ain't it," Eliot says. "We just-- this is ours. This is home. And it's better than I deserve and definitely not what I expected to get out of life, so, yeah, maybe I felt, something, whatever, about it, but don't worry, the feeling's gone now." 

"Will you kiss him for me, please," Hardison says, nudging Parker, who smiles and leans over to Eliot and kisses him once, very slowly. 

"That was from Hardison," she says, and then leans in again for another one. "That was from me." 

"Send him one back from me, would you," Eliot murmurs, and she turns back to Hardison and kisses him twice, lingeringly. 

"Don't turn around," Hardison tells them, when Parker pulls away, "but the kids are _losing their shit_ over there." 

"Who won the bet?" Parker asks. 

"Nish," Hardison chuckles. "My man. Looks like he cleaned up, too, there's a bunch of bills over there." 

Eliot shakes his head. "Damn, Ryan. Letting me down. I really thought they'd get it." 

"We should probably go talk to them," Parker says. "They look like people in need of a job." 

"They certainly do," Hardison agrees. Eliot tosses some cash on the counter for his drink and gives Kat a wave. Jordan and Brady are standing next to them, smiling like they won the lottery. They all grin and give him a thumbs up, and he just laughs and follows Hardison and Parker over to the table where the others are sitting.

"I told you," Nish is saying, as the three of them approach the table where the others are sitting, "I know systems. It's what I do." He happily thumbs through a stack of cash. 

"Evening, folks. Seems like we lost some of you some money tonight," Eliot says. 

"Not me," says Ryan, who is playing with the charred rosemary garnish on their cocktail. They gesture with it to emphasize their point. "I don't bet on people's relationships, because that's weird as hell." 

"I wasn't betting on a relationship! The guy has a reputation!" Dani insists. She looks up at Eliot. "Not like, a bad one, or whatever. Just like, a very heterosexual one." 

Jess peers at him through her fingers. "I can't fucking believe this," she says. "I would have bet pretty much everything I ever stole that you were straight." 

"Sorry to disappoint," he shrugs.

She rolls her eyes. "No, it's fine, I shouldn't have assumed. Why do I bother trying to understand men? I'm such a lesbian," she sighs. Dani pats her on the shoulder. 

"I feel that," Dani says, nodding. "Men. Even queer men, who understands them?"

"Hey, I tried to tell y'all that night at the bar, I know my fellow Southern queers when I see 'em," Ryan says. They meet Eliot's eyes and nod approvingly. "That shit's hard. Good for you." 

"Thanks, I think," he says, and winks at them. "Call me about that family reunion if you really want to raise hell." 

They grin and raise their cocktail glass at him. "Oh, we are definitely doing that." 

"So what brings y'all to Portland?" Hardison says. He looks at Jess. "As I recall, there was a lot of big talk about Paris, Milan, Barcelona--" 

"Selling castles in Dublin," Parker continues. "Heading home to London." 

"Training in L.A.," Eliot says. 

"Yeah, okay, but we-- we had this bet to settle up on," Dani says. "Obviously we had to, you know, deal with that." 

"Yes," Nish says, nodding firmly. "That was it. I'm just here for my money." 

"I _was_ here for my money," Jess grumbles into her glass. "Men. What a headache." She looks over at Ryan, who's the only one who hasn't said anything yet, and clears her throat.

"What? Oh, I just like y'all," Ryan admits, and the other three look at them like they're really letting down the side. "What? I do, y'all are a hoot. It's nice to do crime without having to bother with all the straight people." 

"Mmm," Jess says. She leans over and clinks her glass against Ryan's. "Okay. I will drink to that." 

"Here's an idea, can we steal something for queer people next time?" Nish asks Parker, as he makes a big show of tucking away all his money. "It seems like a common interest." 

"Yeah," says Dani, nodding slowly. "I like hitting bigots. They make the best noises." 

Eliot holds up his hand. Dani slaps it. They both smile.

"Y'all ain't right," Ryan says, eying her and Eliot. "I got zero problems taking down shitty people, though. That was fun. When do we start?" 

"Surely it can't be that hard to find some queer clients," Jess says, looking at Parker. 

"No, but I thought it was just one job," Parker smiles. 

"Maybe two," Hardison adds. 

"Well, one more. We'll probably split up after the next one," Jess says, and Nish and Dani nod, but not very emphatically. Ryan just shrugs. 

"Keep telling yourselves that," Eliot says. He reaches for Hardison's hand, and then Parker's, and tugs them gently in the direction of home. 

+

 **Thursday, May 30th, 2013**  


**June special.**

_Bowl of black lentils and quinoa with pickled watermelon radishes, roasted heirloom carrots and corn, microgreens, blue potatoes, red cabbage, and pickled red onion. Topped with local feta + dill & garlic crema. Better than anything you'd find at a potluck, probably. _

The bar is covered end to end with bowls, plates, and glasses of various shapes and sizes by the time Eliot has everything set out for the staff tasting night. They've closed up so they can preview the June menu tonight, and a lot of this stuff is Pride-related, either because he designed it to be good for party service, or because he just felt sort of like making a nod or two to it. 

"Baby, did you put a rainbow bowl on the menu for June?" Hardison asks, looking it over. 

"Sure looks like it, doesn't it," Eliot says. He tugs on a strand of hair that just won't stay put and fishes in his pockets for a bandanna. "Dammit, this is getting out of control. I don't know why I cut it short." 

"Well, if you're looking for a change, I don't suppose you gave any thought to that undercut idea," Hardison says, wiggling his eyebrows. 

"Oh, I did," Eliot says, winking, "but Parker told me to grow my hair out again." 

"Can't argue with that," Hardison says. 

"I don't intend to," Eliot tells him, and Hardison leans over the bar to kiss him quick before the staff pours in to descend on everything. 

"Holy shit," says Kat, surveying the spread. 

"Yeah," Amy says. "Wow. Does this look better than usual to anyone else?" 

"It's almost Pride Month," says Brady, shrugging. "Everything tastes better in June." 

Eliot waves his hands at them. "Come and get it," he says. "Everything's labeled but ask questions if you've got 'em, you know how this works by now." 

They scatter, Amy and Brady heading for the bar snacks while Kat lingers in front of the main courses with a few of the other servers. 

"Why is there an empty plate in the middle of the bar?" Jordan asks, when he comes in. "Did somebody take all of something already?" 

"Oh, that?" Eliot says. He looks over at Kat. "Huh, I don't know, _maybe_ there's a space on the menu for something someone hasn't talked to me about yet." 

They blush a little. "I know, I know," they say, tapping their fingernails nervously on the bartop. "Tomorrow? I can come in tomorrow, after lunch service?" 

"Deal," he says. "I'm gonna hold you to that." 

"I'll be here," they promise, but before he can give them any more shit about it, the doors from their side of the brewery open and Parker walks in, followed by the rest of the new Leverage team. 

"Ooh, a buffet, don't mind if I do," says Ryan, rubbing their hands together. 

"No-- " Eliot says, but it's too late: all four of them squeeze in alongside the staff, grabbing plates, straws, forks, whatever they want. 

"Hey, man, what the hell," he says, as Nish smiles at him and grabs a straw and passes some forks over to Dani and Jess and Ryan. "Do you all work here now? Because I don't remember hiring you for this." 

"Nope," Dani says. "Ooh, hey, what are those meatballs?" 

"Oh, yeah, definitely try those," says Brady. She passes the plate over. "The glaze on there is unbelievable." 

"Dammit, Brady, don't encourage these people," Eliot complains.

"Is that treacle?" Nish asks suspiciously, eying the meatballs. 

"No, it ain't _treacle_ ," Eliot says. "It's a soy ginger glaze made with brown sugar and--" 

"Mirin and ginger and peppercorns," Brady says. She smiles at him. "It's fine, Eliot, it's like a menu test."

"See? We're helping," Nish says, as he spoons lentils and vegetables from the rainbow bowl onto his plate.

"This is a _mocktail_?" Ryan exclaims, from the middle of the bar. They're holding a straw that they've dipped into a drink, the Nate Ford Special that Eliot made for Lisha. "No way in hell. I know bourbon, there's bourbon in that." 

"Nope, it's barley tea," Kat smiles, and some of the other servers wander over to try it, too. 

Jordan jumps behind the bar and starts making drinks for him and Kat and Ryan-- "I need the practice," he says, winking at Eliot when he raises an eyebrow at him. Dani looks like she might arm wrestle someone for the rest of the meatballs. Jess very successfully steals half the cheese from the charcuterie board right out from under Amy's nose and feigns ignorance when Amy looks back to grab some more and it's gone. And between Nish and Brady the vegetable bowl has been reduced in no time at all to a couple of radish slices and some quinoa.

Everybody's passing his food back and forth and laughing and just generally having a really good time, and Eliot just stands there for a minute, looking from one end of the bar to the other, taking it all in, this weird little family of people that he and Parker and Hardison have built, in no time at all. 

"Eliot," Parker says, waving from the other end of the bar. Of course she's posted up by the desserts. "Hardison!" 

Hardison, who has poured himself a beer and snagged what looks like a whole half of one of the new burgers, gets over to her about the same time he does. 

"I see you have located the desserts," Hardison says, eyeballing the many plates spread out in front of her. 

"Mmhmm," she hums.

Eliot just shakes his head. "You gonna let anyone else try any of those?" he asks Parker, eying the dwindling amount of desserts arrayed in front of her. 

"Maybe," she says. She's holding one of the ramekins of what is essentially a slightly fancier version of lemon icebox pie. "You know, for not-chocolate, this is pretty good," she says. 

"Thanks," he says, reaching over and taking it back from her. She makes a face, but she doesn't wrestle him for it, so it must be love. 

Somebody starts tapping a glass with a spoon, and Eliot turns around to see Kat holding one of the Pride & Joys in one hand and a spoon in the other. They smile at him like they've got something up their sleeve. 

"Does everybody have a drink?" Jordan asks, passing a couple of glasses to a few people without one. He looks down the bar in their direction. "Eliot?" 

Hardison hands him his beer and grabs one of the extra Nate Ford Specials for himself. "We're good here, man," he says, smiling at Jordan, and Eliot frowns over at him. 

"What is happening," he mutters, and Hardison smiles at him and lifts his glass. "Aw, hell." 

"As long as we're all here," Hardison says, "I realize we never really cracked a bottle of champagne on this new place with everyone together, so-- I'd like to propose a toast. To our team," he says. "Both of them. We couldn't do what we do without you." 

"To good food," Kat says. They smile at Eliot, and he smiles back. "And the people who make it." 

"To making money," Parker says. "Lots of money. Loooots of money." 

"And jewelry," Jess adds. 

"Yes," says Parker. "That." 

"To good fights," says Dani. She looks over at Jess. "And good friends." 

"To winning bets," Nish smiles, and Dani and Jess groan. 

"What do you all _do_ , anyway?" Amy asks, and they all just shrug. 

"To brunch," Jordan says, winking at Eliot. "And all the people who figured out recently they belong there." 

"It's almost June," Brady says. "To Pride, and the people who fought for us to have what we have." 

"I don't really go here," Ryan says, raising their glass, "but I'll drink to that. And to, you know, any of my other Southern and/or Heartland queers." 

Eliot gives them half a smile, and they gesture with their glass. 

Hardison nudges him. "Your turn, man," he murmurs, and Eliot looks around at all of them, these people who belong to him, and who he belongs to, too. 

"To family," he says, and they drink.


	11. epilogue.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A wedding.

The wedding is surprisingly short but very well-attended. All of Sophie's drama students have turned up to see their mentor get married; they're led around like little ducklings by Zachary. There's a fair number of the people they've helped over the years-- Hurley, with Peggy, Cora, a lot of other people whose names Eliot honestly can't even remember. They really did a lot of people a lot of good, he realizes, looking around. 

And they made some trouble, too. Even the Italian has made an appearance, he sees. And Tara, of course. She looks at Parker and Hardison and Eliot and their joined hands and just smirks. 

There's not really a wedding party to speak of, it's just Nate and Sophie up there with-- well, how 'bout that, Vlad, as the officiant-- so they take up the seats at the front, in the section reserved for family. Parker sits between him and Hardison, her head leaning against Eliot's shoulder and her hand resting on Hardison's leg. Their arms are slung around the back of her chair. 

It's actually a sweet little ceremony. There's only one reading, and he's going to lose some money to Parker, because it is not anything from Shakespeare. It's a poem. One of Sophie's former students gets up and recites it, and he's not usually much for poetry but something about it grabs him from the first line and won't let go. _You do not have to be good_ , Sophie's student reads. There's something about repentance, and how you don't have to look for it, and maybe something about finding the place you belong. It's a lot, after the last few months, or maybe the last few years. Hell, maybe his whole life. Maybe he sheds a few tears over it. Quietly. But if he can't do that sitting here with the two people who love him the most in the world there's probably not a good place to do it. It's not like he's gone soft, anyway. Just ask the guys that tried to stop him on their last job. 

The reception is elaborate in all the ways the ceremony was simple. There's a full band playing soft music, dinner and desserts and a table full of champagne flutes with what looks like a whole vineyard's worth of champagne. He's a little surprised that it's not a full plated dinner service, but there's servers wandering here and there with trays of _hors d'oeuvres_ , including, unless he misses his guess, an actual tray of _pâté d’escargot avec beurre d'Argentine_. He grabs one as it passes by, and sure enough, it is. He laughs to himself. It's a nice touch. Much nicer than greasy duck. 

Parker pulls Eliot along onto the dance floor just as the music picks up into something a little faster, a little less soft. The song is upbeat and has the right tempo, so for a laugh he teaches her some two-step, and she catches on pretty quick, because she's Parker. He spins her around a few times and enjoys the occasional excuse to pull her close, and she laughs and stays with him until the song changes, then she leaves him for a dessert table that she spotted through the crowd. 

Hardison comes to stand beside him in the middle of the floor. 

"Well, she left me for dessert," Eliot says, watching her go.

"It was always gonna be that way," Hardison says. 

"True," he agrees. 

"Oh, damn. Did we pack her any of her rigs?" Hardison asks, as they watch Parker fill a small plate with a large amount of chocolate cake, petits four, and what looks to be mini tartes au citron. "Because she's gonna climb the damn walls with all that sugar." 

"As long as nobody gives her coffee, maybe we'll be okay," he says. He turns back to Hardison and holds out his hand. 

Hardison pretends to be shocked. "You asking me to dance? Because you're supposed to say, _may I have this dance_ , it's very romantic, you could try to be a little romantic, we're at a wedding--" 

"Dammit, Hardison," he says, and pulls him close. "Shut up and dance with me." 

Maybe he should feel weird about this, but he doesn't. Hardison looks pretty damn good in his suit and his cologne is spicy and warm, and there's not much in Eliot's head aside from that and the music and the first line of that damn poem. 

"I think I should thank you," he says, squeezing Hardison's hip gently. 

"For what? Being extremely handsome and making you look so good right now?" 

Eliot ignores him. Maybe he steps on his foot a little. Just a little. "For being patient with me, you asshole," he says. "You didn't have to. You would have been well within your rights to kick me to the curb or not bother with me in the first place." 

"Well, the problem with that was, we kind of wanted you around," Hardison says. "So that wasn't really an option." 

"There are just-- there are probably a million times that I should have just said something, or held your hand, or whatever, and I didn't," Eliot says. "And if it takes the rest of my life I promise I'll make it up to you." 

"You don't have a single thing to make up for," Hardison says gently, but then he gives Eliot this over the top wink, and it does kind of ruin the moment. "But if you feel like trying, I'm not gonna say no." 

"I'm trying to have a moment with you, here, man," Eliot grumbles, and Hardison laughs softly and tugs him closer. 

"I know," he says. "So shut up already, why are you talking through your moment?" 

"Dammit, Hardison," Eliot says again, but it comes out awful soft, and it sounds even more than usual like what it really means, which is maybe ninety-five percent _I love you_ and five-percent _Bless your damn heart._

When the music ends they drift apart for a bit, Hardison to assess how much of the dessert buffet Parker has managed to consume and Eliot to grab a drink for himself and find a quiet table off to the side. He watches the people milling around, laughing and talking. It's the right group of people for this little affair, probably, but he can't help but feel like something's missing. He'll never, ever say it out loud, but he almost kind of misses the new team. Fortunately, he's not alone with that thought for too long. 

"There you are. I am very upset with you, I will have you know," Sophie says, dropping gracefully into the empty seat next to him. 

He frowns over at her. "What did I do?" 

"Do you know who the happiest person at a wedding is supposed to be?" Sophie demands. She raps her clutch against his shoulder. "The bride." 

"You look pretty happy to me," he says. 

"I'm sure that I do! But not half as much as you. Upstaged at my own wedding. The absolute cheek," she says, and because it's Sophie, it's very convincing for about fifteen seconds, and then a smile breaks across her face like a sunrise. "I didn't actually think I could be any happier today, and then there the three of you were. I am thrilled for you. Truly." 

"Thanks," he says, smiling back. "And thanks for the note in the invite. We had a disagreement over whether or not you knew." 

"Eliot," she says, a look of slight concern creasing her brow, as though perhaps he has missed something, "the man bought you a restaurant. It wasn't at all subtle." 

"I caught on eventually," he says. "Turns out it wasn't just the restaurant." 

"Hmm. And how is your restaurant?" 

"Good. Real good. You should come see for yourself sometime," he tells her. "I put a drink on the menu for you and everything. Nate, too." 

"I'm touched, but someone else will have to enjoy it for me," Nate says, appearing from behind a couple of guests. He takes the seat next to Sophie, slips his arm around her, and toasts Eliot with a glass of sparkling water. 

"You can, actually, man, it's non-alcoholic," Eliot says. "Even kind of tastes like it has whiskey in it." 

"Hmm. Doubt you could fool anyone in Dublin with that, no matter how good it is," Nate says pointedly, and Eliot smiles. 

"I wouldn't know anything about fooling anyone in Dublin," he says. He smiles wider when Hardison and Parker walk up behind Nate. He points at them. "And neither would these people." 

"What are we not doing?" Hardison asks, sliding in next to Eliot, with Parker on his other side. 

"Conning people in Dublin," Eliot says. 

"Hmm. Never been there," Hardison says. 

"Nope. Never even heard of it," says Parker, shaking her head. From the way the tablecloth is moving over by her, he's guessing her legs are bouncing back and forth under her chair.

"How much sugar did you have?" Eliot asks. 

"I had to sample everything," she says, waving her hands. He sees now that there is some frosting smeared on the inside of her thumb. "Now that I like food I wanted to know if it was as good as yours." 

"Was it?" 

She shakes her head. "The lemon things were close. Reminded me of the pie you made." 

"I told you we spent too much on catering," Nate tells Sophie, who smiles dangerously at him. "Or maybe not enough," he amends, and looks over at Parker. "You're really not gonna tell me how you ran Dublin?" 

Parker smiles. "If I had anything to do with anything that may have recently happened in Dublin," she says, "here's what I'd do." 

She walks Nate through all of it. Hardison seems determined to be her head cheerleader for the evening and interrupts her every few minutes to say something about how great she was, but Eliot can't blame him. They're both really proud of her, and she hears that from him and Hardison plenty. But this is different, and it's nice, watching Nate be proud of her, too. He knows it means a lot to her, even if she doesn't say it, and she deserves the recognition. 

Sophie leans over to him while they're still talking. "I heard you acquired a new grifter." 

"We did," he nods. "But don't worry, no one can replace Sophie Devereaux. We took a vote on that and everything, made it nice and official. But what were we going to do, send Hardison in?" 

"I suppose not. But why not you?" she asks. 

"What?" 

"You," she says, tapping his arm, "have a lot of untapped potential. I wondered if you might...lean into it a little bit." 

"I seem to recall a promise I made," he reminds her, nodding over at Hardison and Parker. "To keep them safe?" 

"Yes, but Eliot, I never said you had to do it with your fists," she says. "Not all the time, anyway. And you've got a new hitter now." 

"By _new_ I'm assuming you mean _younger_ ," he grumbles. "What is it with everybody trying to get me to retire, lately? Don't know what that's about." 

"Don't be absurd, I'm not trying to get you to retire. Not now, anyway," Sophie insists. She waves her hand over at his partners. "But your life is a little different now, and it's nice to keep your options open. Just think about it. Spend some time with your grifter, learn from them. I have heard good things about Ryan." 

"Yeah. In their own words, they're a hoot," he chuckles. He looks over at Hardison and Parker, then back to Sophie. "I'll think about it." 

"Thank you. Go forth and grift with my blessing, if you want," she says, gripping his arm gently. She stands up and holds her hand out to her husband. "I think you owe me at least one more dance," she says. 

"You heard the lady," Eliot says. 

"I did," Nate acknowledges. He takes Sophie's hand and looks around at all of them. "We're very proud of you. All of you." 

"If you're ever in Portland, you know where to find us," Hardison says. 

"Yeah," Parker says. "The food is delicious and the beer is no longer a mouth crime." 

"And I work hard at keeping it that way," Eliot says. He smiles at the two of them. "Congratulations." 

"And the same to you," Sophie says, and Nate claps him on the shoulder as he leads Sophie back towards the dance floor. 

"Well," Hardison says, reaching out for Parker's hand and Eliot's, "we came, we danced, Parker ate all the cake. Now what?" 

"Hey, there's still more cake over there," Parker says, and when they look at her with vague alarm, she just laughs. "I'm good. See? Restraint." 

"Hmm," Hardison hums skeptically. "Maybe we should stay away from it just in case." 

"Maybe we can just enjoy sitting here for a bit," Eliot suggests. "We don't stop much lately. This is nice." 

"Weddings make you very sentimental," Parker observes, and he tries to glare at her, but he can't really muster the will. 

"Maybe," he says. "It was a nice poem, that's all. And-- I like weddings." 

"In that case," Hardison says, "I'm sorry you sort of married us in what is essentially our office. There wasn't a party. There wasn't even any wine."

"Or cake," Parker frowns. 

"Yeah, well, I didn't need a party and a cake," Eliot says softly. "I said my vows already." 

"Weddings _do_ make you very sentimental," Hardison says. "You're not hiding rings in your pockets, are you?" 

"I'm not," he says, looking over at both of them, and he doesn't actually have anything up his sleeve or any rings in his pockets, but he has thought a lot over the last few months about what it means to belong to people, and what it means to tell the world that you do, so he adds, "but would you wear them if I was?" 

"I mean, you're right, we pretty much already said all the stuff," Hardison says. "And I'm not going anywhere. So-- yeah. I would." 

"Yes from me, too," Parker says, "but only if you steal mine." 

Eliot shakes his head and gets to his feet, holding out his hands to both of them. "The first ones are custom work," he says, like this should be obvious, and really, it should. "I'll steal the anniversary ones." 

"Okay," Parker shrugs, but she smiles at him and steps close to give him a kiss, and Hardison does the same. 

He slips his hands into theirs. "Let's go home," he says, and they thread their way through the crowd, together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I couldn't write a pair of stories with titles from "Wild Geese" and not have it actually referenced somewhere in the story, right? So here it is, at the end, as part of a wedding ceremony. 
> 
> I really hope you enjoyed this! I'm so grateful to everyone who read it. ♥

**Author's Note:**

> Big thanks once again to my wife, [leiascully](https://archiveofourown.org/users/leiascully/pseuds/leiascully), for reading this, cheering me on, and just generally telling me it was okay to write this. 
> 
> \--
> 
> This story is a lot of my own story. It isn't perfect. Eliot doesn't get it right all the time, and neither do I. We're still learning. I only really came out myself a little over ten years ago, and if I look back on this in another ten years I'm sure I'll have a good laugh at myself, because my understanding and engagement with my own queerness isn't a fixed point. This story also takes place over a few months of time, when the reality of my life is that it has taken me a hell of a lot longer to get where I am, and I'm still not where I'd like to be. I can't get the time back that I've lost not being able or willing to be my authentic self, but I can give some of that lost time to Eliot. But, imperfect or not, this is for all the rest of my Southern and Heartland queers who came out for the first time late in life, past even our peers, who still struggle with our identities in relation to the places and the people that raised us, who still sometimes go ten rounds with ourselves just to be affectionate with the people we love in public, and who are so proud of younger queer people for being who they are so loudly so early on, but who also wish that we'd had it together that early, too. I see y'all. I know sometimes you don't feel particularly brave. You are. There's nothing and no one you have to be but yourself to be queer enough. And your story matters, even if you're still writing it, even if you can't tell it yet. I do think it's like a potluck. Take what you like, throw the rest out. Come back later if you missed something you wanted. There's plenty to go around, and we're gonna be okay.


End file.
